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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24977341">The Walk</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kirilee/pseuds/Kirilee'>Kirilee</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Symplectic AU [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Alternate Original Series (Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Academy Era, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, BAMF Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Blood and Injury, Easter Eggs, Female Leonard "Bones" McCoy, Hostage Situations, Implied/Referenced Suicide, James T. Kirk is a Good Friend, Language, Tarsus IV, hand wavy medical and science stuff</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-07-20</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 01:21:04</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Graphic Depictions Of Violence</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>28,957</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24977341</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kirilee/pseuds/Kirilee</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Jim Kirk isn't the only one dealing with a daddy's legacy.  At least his daddy died a hero.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Symplectic AU [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/2035996</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>53</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>1. Daddy Issues</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>Doctor McCoy is my favorite character from TOS and AOS Star Trek.  I love many, many of the fics written featuring McCoy.  This fic stemmed from my attempt to engage the character as female.  Once I got in touch with her, she told me a story that I had to write down.</p><p>Disclaimer: The Star Trek franchise and its characters are property of Paramount.  I make no profit from Star Trek in any of its incarnations. </p><p>In Chapter 1, italicized brackets are McCoy’s thoughts.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>On the third Friday evening in a row that she prepared to head over to San Francisco General Hospital for a weekend-long shift, Doctor Leta McCoy paused outside her dorm to wipe the graffiti off the door. Vandals would replace the message before the night was over, but erasing it whenever she could was a matter of principal. Entering the tiny apartment for the first time in two days, she took a quick sonic shower, dressed in non-descript street clothes, and replaced some of the toiletry items and clothes in the duffle that she carried with her most of the time nowadays. McCoy could get clean scrubs and a medkit refill at SFGH, a place that treated her like the doctor she was. More than the luxury of sleeping in an actual bed at night, she wanted her good name back.</p>
<p>Leta pondered the current state of affairs while she replicated some rice, then checked it with her medical tricorder before eating. She wouldn’t put it past someone to have tampered with the replicator. At the moment, Leta was too tired to get indignant about being ostracized at the Academy and taken out of Starfleet Medical like the trash. She was actually looking forward to that poor excuse for a couch in the break room at SFGH.</p>
<p>This was going to be the third weekend straight that Doctor McCoy was working at the SFGH trauma center, instead of the Academy clinic, because she was considered too controversial at Starfleet right now to treat cadets. About a month ago, cadets had started complaining to their mommies and daddies about being on the same campus with her and possibly being treated at the clinic by “the Tarsus IV doctor,” based on a posting on the Academy intranet about an incident in class. Hover-parents had flooded the Commandant of Cadets with comms about not wanting their babies to be contaminated by Doctor McCoy. “My [insert name here] is <em>so smart</em>, top of their class! I’m sure [insert name here] would know if the rumor wasn’t true!” After cautioning parents that the matter was being looked into, the Commandant bravely engaged in a tactical retreat by deferring action to the Surgeon General since McCoy was in the medical division.</p>
<p>The Surgeon General went one step further - further backwards, that is. Instead of standing up to the rumor with facts, like the fact that Leta McCoy was a minor at the time of the Tarsus IV massacre, the Surgeon General turned his back on the issue. He himself ordered Doctor McCoy to take time out from Academy clinic duty and work at a civilian hospital. He claimed it was to get ahead on her community service hours, as if anyone in Starfleet believed that right now. Cadets had three and a half years to log community service hours and this was only her second semester. The new duty assignment was going to last “until an effective relationship among medical professionals is established between Starfleet and San Francisco General Hospital,” or as long as it took the Surgeon General to locate his spine. Leta figured that would take the entire semester.</p>
<p>Of the other physicians at Starfleet Medical, only Phillip Boyce had spoken up against Doctor McCoy’s reassignment.  He pointed out that Leta had been a child at the time her father was associated with Kodos and she shouldn’t suffer the consequences of a parent’s poor judgement. Nevertheless, because public opinion fueled by hearsay was one of the strongest known forces in the universe, community service had been Doctor McCoy’s only option to continue working as a physician while at Starfleet Academy, until further notice.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Never let facts get in the way of a good story.]</em>
</p>
<p>Of course, if Doctor McCoy had been thinking more clearly when Captain Pike was trying to recruit her, she would have planned for this. Something about her father was bound to come out sooner, not later, in Starfleet. Cadets were likely to have more personal connections with Tarsus IV than other people since they usually came from families who were more receptive to going off-planet. Some family members of ‘Fleet personnel could have died on Tarsus IV. Many cadets came from families with generations of Starfleet service. A few of those might have ‘Fleet relatives who had been involved with the Tarsus IV rescue and recovery efforts, and been careless with commentary afterward. Even though most Tarsus IV information was classified, some people did not respect confidentiality the way they should.  The medical profession had the same problem. Consequently, many cadets were probably extra-sensitive about it, some of them with just enough knowledge to be dangerous, mixed with the indiscretion of youth.</p>
<p>If Leta had paid more attention to the issue or had consulted with Pike, maybe she could have at least prepared more cogent arguments when Jake Finnegan confronted her about her father’s history with Kodos during class. Maybe she could have given Jim the heads up.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I wouldn't blame him if he called me bone<strong>headed</strong>, instead of Bones.]</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span class="u">Four weeks earlier...</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p>The class was <em>History of the Federation: Ethical Considerations, Part 2</em>. Part one of the same class, during the first semester, focused on first contact by Vulcan and the prime directive. The second semester syllabus was to focus on criteria for membership, colonization, and alliances. As often happened for this class, Jim and Bones arrived together at the lecture hall, having seen each other at breakfast in the mess. They sat in the nosebleed seats, back row near the door. Jim always seemed to be conscious of escape routes, which dovetailed with Leta’s habit. Neither of them had openly acknowledged their insecurities to the other. One of the reasons they had a rapport was the unspoken agreement that they did not need to justify everything right away in order to be friends. If explanation of something was needed, it would happen naturally, in due time. On the morning of the classroom shit show, one of those times came due and their no-fault friendship formula was tested. Spectacularly.</p>
<p>Three minutes before the start of class, the title of the day’s lecture, <em>Tarsus IV: Colonization Catastrophe,</em> appeared on the holovid screen. Though he had just arrived, Jim popped up and headed towards the door. Bones sat up ramrod straight, folded her arms in front of her, and clenched her jaw, as she tried to decide whether to follow him out of the lecture hall. She didn’t know Jim’s reason for leaving, although she couldn’t blame him given the horrific subject matter. She wasn’t going to question him either. In her own head, McCoy was struggling with the academic obligation to stay versus enduring two hours of painful memories associated with Tarsus IV.</p>
<p>She didn’t have to struggle. Jake Finnegan made the decision for her.</p>
<p>Several seats away in the last row, Jake leaned in to look at Leta and almost shouted, “<em>You </em>should be the one leaving, McCoy. We don’t need your <em>stink</em> in here.”</p>
<p>Leta’s heart thumped in her chest from the instant adrenalin dump. She waited for the other shoe to drop as her pulse pounded and her face flushed.</p>
<p>A rumble ran through the room as dozens of people began to whisper and turned in their seats to look at the developing confrontation.</p>
<p>Jim spun around at the door. What the fuck?! Bones didn’t make an effort to make friends, but she didn’t have enemies, as far as he knew.</p>
<p>At the front of the room, Professor Nguyen tried to calm the disturbance, mistakenly thinking that the cadet leaving was involved, “I realize that Tarsus IV is a very emotional subject for many people, but I encourage everyone to stay for the important lessons it can teach us.”</p>
<p>Finnegan looked at the professor and called out, “One of the murderers is right here, in this class. <em>She</em> could teach us.” He turned around and looked at the Doctor again. “Isn’t that right, McCoy?"</p>
<p>Jim watched Bones unfold herself and face Finnegan. Cadets in between them looked like they wanted to fade through the backs of their seats so they didn’t get caught in the crossfire. Bones’ voice, which tended to be a little deeper than most women’s voices, was almost sonorous. Since Jim knew the thickness of Bones’ southern accent was proportional to her emotions or fatigue, he could tell she was enraged. The drawled resonance of her responses could be heard throughout the room.</p>
<p>“<em>No, it’s not.</em> If you’re gonna talk about me and mine, get the facts straight, Finnegan."</p>
<p>“Oh, so you deny that your family supported Governor Kodos?"</p>
<p>“My <em>father</em> supported Kodos <em>before</em> the colony was established. He paid the price and now he’s <em>dead</em>. I was a child. None of the other McCoys were involved."</p>
<p>“The nuts don’t fall far from the tree, <em>Doctor,</em>” Finnegan practically spat the title back at Bones.</p>
<p>“Cut the horseshit! The people who murdered my sister said the same thing. You’re as bad as them."</p>
<p>"That's a lie!"</p>
<p>“Welcome to the party, <em>pal</em>. How does it feel to be guilty by association?"</p>
<p>"Fuck you, McCoy!"</p>
<p>“You will <em>never</em> have the pleasure, I <em>assure</em> you!” She said this last with an inky drawl that would have been sultry, if the topic wasn’t so macabre. The word “assure” acquired a third syllable, imported from Georgia.</p>
<p>Failing to get under McCoy’s skin with the direct approach, Jake pivoted to a familiar target, McCoy’s buddy, “Kirk! I can’t believe the son of a Starfleet hero is associating with this trash!"</p>
<p>
  <em>[Hypocrisy, thy name is Finnegan!]</em>
</p>
<p>Jake was from one of those “traditional” ‘Fleet families that acted like the service owed them. He fostered the story that Jim got into the Academy by virtue of the Kirk name and not by merit, exactly the sort of thing that the Finnegan family had a long-standing reputation for, but denied with a wink and a nod. Some big, sanctimonious balls right there. Jim snorted at Finnegan’s fainting couch rhetoric, but didn’t dignify it with a comment.</p>
<p>At the sound of Jim’s derision, Leta turned to look at him and wished she hadn’t. As their eyes met, Jim’s face was frozen in an impassive mask. He looked back at the vid screen and ducked out of the room. The thought of Jim considering for even a moment that Finnegan could be right about her was demoralizing at best. Leta hadn’t felt that…dirty since she had been dumped by Jocelyn. Regardless, McCoy wouldn’t make herself feel any dirtier by giving Finnegan the satisfaction of driving her away from class. She sat back in her seat, folded her arms across her chest, and determined to stay in class out of spite.</p>
<p>Professor Nguyen used the tense pause to put a stop to further verbal sparring or any commentary about the standoff. People moved their seats away from McCoy for the rest of class and gave her a wide berth when exiting the room. Before class was over, rumors about the McCoys traveled from comm to PADD to the Academy intranet. Like rain water picking up dirt as it hits the ground and runs off, the story was muddied from the outset and got progressively worse.  It morphed from Leta’s father being Kodos’ assistant, to being Kodos' best friend, to being a doctor on Tarsus IV, to bringing Leta to be his nurse on Tarsus IV, to finally Leta being “the Tarsus IV doctor."</p>
<p>Despite Leta’s protestations, it appeared that almost everyone else bought into Finnegan’s point of view or didn’t want to take the chance of associating with her. No one walked within ten feet of her around campus, even taking detours to avoid her. “Kodos’ cunt” scrawls started to appear on her dorm room door immediately after the classroom clusterfuck. Leta washed away the tags religiously when she stopped at her dorm room, but they reappeared the next day, every time. More than the confrontation in the lecture hall, the painted insults stoked a burning anger in her gut for the cowardice they represented.</p>
<p>
  <em>[So much for the Federation's finest.]</em>
</p>
<p>The Surgeon General’s decision to exile Doctor McCoy professionally came two days later, a move which emboldened certain cadets to graduate from shunning to bullying. Hits in basic hand-to-hand combat class became hard enough to do more damage than was allowed, but not enough damage to be obvious during class.  McCoy did not bring any more attention to herself and treated the contusions with her own medkit. If she couldn’t show up to the Academy clinic as a doctor, she surely didn’t want to endure scrutiny as a patient with suspicious bruises. Someone would probably accuse her of hurting herself, which would prompt a humiliating investigation. After coffee accidentally-on-purpose spilled on her in the mess, McCoy didn’t go back there. Going off campus to local eateries would leave her even more exposed to mischief than the mess, so she paid extra charges to have food beamed to her location. TAs for lecture-style classes readily agreed to allow McCoy access to class recordings, instead of insisting on her attendance, in order to prevent other incidents.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Paranoia doesn't mean they're not out to get you.]</em>
</p>
<p>Lab work was the only area of Leta’s Academy life untouched by the intimidation squad. Either the tight security protocols for pathogen samples were a deterrent or somebody didn’t relish bleeding from their eyeballs with a case of Andorian shingles…or worse. The silver lining was that McCoy made great progress on her study of human-Denobulan CV transmission.</p>
<p>Leta returned to looking out for herself like in the days after her sister was murdered. As far as the other cadets were concerned, McCoy virtually disappeared from campus unless she needed to change clothes or was absolutely required to be somewhere. Campus security could find her, true, but being invisible to them was not the goal. Leta didn’t want to be an easy target for the harassment crew. Too bad she had to hide in a place she was supposed to be safe.</p>
<p>Jim didn’t contact Leta for a few days after her classroom confrontation with Finnegan. She had begun to fear that he was like everyone else treating her like a pariah, but Leta admitted to herself now that she hadn’t given Jim enough credit. Several days post-Finnegan, he reached out to her with a message, “Hey, Bones. How are you doing? I’m here to listen."</p>
<p>It had been a relief and a comfort, and a pull at her heartstrings she couldn’t define, to find out that Jim hadn’t completely written her off. She even wiped away tears when she read Jim’s first message, alone in a corner of the library.</p>
<p>
  <em>
    <span class="u">Present day...</span>
  </em>
</p>
<p><span class="u"></span>The clatter of her spoon in the empty rice bowl brought Leta’s thoughts back to the present and her recent communications with Jim. The rice stuck like a lump in her throat.</p>
<p>Jim had continued to send messages once every few days, inviting her to tell her side of the story or just reaching out. Jim was trying to be supportive while giving her space. She would have done the same for him. Leta’s replies let him know that she was really, really grateful for his support even though she wasn’t ready to talk to him face to face. Conversations about being accused of murder should happen in person.</p>
<p>Jim had shown what a good friend he was by throwing her a lifeline. Now, Leta was kicking herself for not grabbing that lifeline with all her might. After Jim’s first comm, she should have met with him. She had told herself she didn’t want Jim’s career to suffer the taint from her family background, which was true, but she should have given him the choice. If Leta was being honest with herself, she hadn’t wanted to take the chance of experiencing embarrassment about her father with someone who<em> mattered</em>.</p>
<p>Their usual we-don’t-talk-about-feelings-directly repartee was completely inadequate for a conversation about Leta’s father and Tarsus IV because she got profoundly angry. Just contemplating such a conversation and she was cleaning her rice bowl like it had offended her. McCoy’s usual sarcastic way of dealing with uncomfortable issues would be a caged beast straining to be let loose, wanting to tear into the subject of abandonment by fathers. Until the most recent anniversary of the <em>Kelvin</em> disaster, McCoy hadn’t made the connection about who Jim’s father was, something Jim seemed to think was refreshing, despite Leta feeling stupid about it. Since the anniversary, she understood why Jim’s feelings about his own father were complicated. Leta knew that directing snark at Jim about fathers would be going too far, even if the father being snarked was her own. Jim deserved better than that. The victims of the <em>Kelvin</em> and Tarsus IV deserved better. She would keep the sarcasm to herself this time.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Jim Kirk isn't the only one dealing with a daddy's legacy.  At least his daddy died a hero.]</em>
</p>
<p>Her daddy issues just kept getting bigger. They continued to shape her life, no matter how hard Leta H. McCoy, M.D., tried to be the architect of her adulthood. The trope was so cliché it was laughable, except when it wasn’t, like when they took away her ability to practice medicine at Starfleet. They put her away like she was putting away her bowl right now. Just close the closet door so you don’t see it.</p>
<p>With all of these considerations, even simple responses to Jim’s messages were hard. Her reply a few days ago was about the best she could do, “How am I doing? I feel sick. Every day is a reminder that my father helped start the career of a mass murderer, my sister was killed because of it, and I’m being punished for it."</p>
<p>
  <em>[Things can't get any worse, right?]</em>
</p>
<p>As Leta turned off the dorm lights, punched in the door lock code, and walked in the shadows to her cross-town transport stop, little did she know that David McCoy’s legacy would explode into a hostage crisis the next day, with terrorists demanding that she give herself over to them in place of her dead father.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0002"><h2>2. David McCoy's Legacy</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Chapter 2 is long because it provides deep background on McCoy in this AU.  McCoy is four years older than Kirk, instead of six.  For those who might be triggered, this chapter also mentions suicide and describes death by physical trauma.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>David McCoy was a physician by education, but he left patient care early in his career in a meteoric rise through the administrative ranks, to become medical director of one of the planet-wide healthcare systems. In spite of the importance of his position, and maybe because of it, he was not content. Either way, giving up prestige meant acknowledging failure, which was as intolerable as his present position was unfulfilling. So, when he didn’t find contentment in the present, Doctor McCoy sought it in the past.</p>
<p>To be fair, the past had always clung to McCoys. For most of the family, the past was a foundation and a caution. For a few, like David, the past was a trap and a delusion. In his professional life, David promoted the use of the latest technology, while in his personal life, he began to romanticize a return to teachings of centuries ago. He started to associate with people who preached rugged individualism in the light, but exclusivity and xenophobia in the dark. Unfortunately, David ignored the lessons written in the blood of his ancestors.</p>
<p>After the most recent of those blood-lettings, WWIII, the surviving McCoys took their Old South old money and bought what had been an eastern Georgia town before the war. Various branches of the family tree lived in homes scattered throughout the former town, now an estate. Neighbors (a debatable term since non-McCoy homes were many kilometers away) called the estate the “McCoy compound.” To family members it was simply “the Homestead.”</p>
<p>A complex legal arrangement, originally crafted by great-grandma Lizbeth McCoy, governed the mutual benefits and obligations of the scions to the estate. It was updated by the family in 2230, spearheaded by David’s brother Darren, the estate’s solicitor. The update was a pre-emptive move by Uncle Darren and other relatives to protect the estate from David’s new acquaintances, some of whom were reactionary to the point of being predatory. David was apparently blind to being manipulated, but the rest of the family could see it clearly. David pitched a fit to no avail. Darren talked like a good ol’ boy, but litigated like their ancestor Jack, a 20<sup>th</sup> century legal legend.</p>
<p>David McCoy lived in a large house on what used to be the town’s main street, along with his wife and two daughters. He determined that his identical twin girls should be acculturated in the past. In this endeavor, David McCoy sought enlightenment from his clique, rather than seeking wisdom from his extended family. David claimed his new associations would benefit the children; they would see and be seen with the right people, whom he called “aspirational traditionalists.” Darren pointed out that people who embraced such a label were the embodiment of oxymorons, or just plain morons.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, the only activities David approved for the girls were those that would get the children noticed by certain families in this traditionalist group. One family, with the surname of Kodos, gave their daughter, Lenore, lessons in archery, dance, and fencing, supposedly consistent with the father’s philosophy, and so the McCoy twins took those lessons too. David went further and began to support Mr. Kodos’ professional and political career in small ways, such as an invitation to a gala or introduction to a certain person. David’s attentions were repaid with Adrian Kodos’ sermons about a utopian society off-planet, run by those like himself or maybe David, who were enlightened by the past.</p>
<p>Almost too late, David’s wife, Eleanora, saw the depth of his infatuation with Kodos and the cult-like nature of the cabal. She also realized her complicity in supporting them by her failure to point out twisted truths early on. Eleanora had allowed herself to be lulled into a false sense of security by David’s lucrative career, missing so many opportunities to push back against the lies. To be honest, she should have put her foot down from the beginning, when her husband insisted on those pretentious, archaic middle names for the girls that the family couldn’t pronounce.</p>
<p>
  <em><span class="u">David on Donna Eugenie and Leta Honorine</span>: “It’s ‘YOU-zhe-nee, not ‘you-GEE-nee,’ and it’s ‘ah-no-REEN,’ not ‘ah-no-RYAN.’"</em>
</p>
<p>
  <em><span class="u">Aunt Tilly</span>: “Not in Jaw-jah, it ain’t!”</em>
</p>
<p>Instead, Eleanora had given in on that decision and all manner of other little things, telling herself that David’s obsessive nostalgia was just his way of being protective. She had not objected when the rhetoric of her husband’s clique became exclusionary, even though the Eleanora of her own youth would not have met their standards.</p>
<p>Seeing her husband’s personal PADD activated one day, Eleanora opened a file of Kodos’ discourses and heard the same lies that had led to three world wars and millions of deaths.</p>
<p>Alarmed, Eleanora knew she needed to respond for the sake of her children, if not her husband. She used her own considerable intellectual gifts to articulate counter-arguments to Kodos’ ideas. At home, she apologized to Darren for being obtuse and arranged for the twins to spend as much time as possible with extended family, away from the “right” families (morons).</p>
<p>Unfortunately, Eleanora’s efforts were too little, too late. Her eloquent arguments could not compete with the vision of paradise that had captured her husband’s imagination. The inevitable conflict between spouses erupted into the open when David told Eleanora that he had made a donation to Kodos’ Tarsus IV colony project. She filed for divorce and full custody, saying he was no longer the man she married because his support of Kodos’ ideas was a betrayal of David’s oath as a doctor. Faced with the potential breakup of his marriage, David refused to give any more financial support to the Tarsus IV project, a requirement for Eleanora to rescind her petition. Donna and Leta, both in their early teens, agreed that the divorce action and its withdrawal was drama worthy of Shakespeare. Donna quipped, “The play’s the thing wherein she caught the conscience of the king!”</p>
<p>David was indeed caught. Kodos’ gang retaliated with blackmail, orchestrating charges of misconduct against David, who was forced to resign under a cloud. Kodos used Doctor McCoy’s fall from grace as an example to others he wished to extort for funding. Eventually, Darren proved the charges to be false, but the damage had been done to David’s high-profile career, his reputation, and his self-worth. He withdrew into himself, never again leaving the Homestead.</p>
<p>To the McCoy sisters, their father’s despondency was the culmination of years of dissatisfaction. Since they were quite small, the twins had been aware that Daddy was unhappy. As is the way of children, they assumed his sadness was their fault. Their father’s friends seemed to confirm this, since they were always comparing the twins to their own kids, like Lenore, and the McCoy girls were always found to be wanting. Donna and Leta were never as smart, or as fast, or as talented. Still, the twins strived to be the best to make their daddy happy. Of course, it never worked. Excelling in school beyond any expectations and taking the top two spots in the Terran youth fencing championships changed nothing.</p>
<p>Naturally, the twins became skeptical of adults as they got older. By the time Eleanora began her belated efforts to counter her husband’s beliefs, the girls doubted her sincerity. Leta scoffed outright.</p>
<p>The twins learned to keep counsel between themselves, each other being the only one they could trust completely. They even had secret nicknames, Genie (Donna Eugenie) and Rini (Leta Honorine), poking fun at their father’s choices of middle names. Leta used her plain-spoken and sarcastic manner as a shield, keeping most people at arms-length. Donna was more careful in conversation than Leta, but was an astute judge of people, the embodiment of “give every man thy ear, but few thy voice.” The McCoy girls could read and take comfort in each other with the uncanny ease of identical twins, their communication so seamless that it appeared telepathic at times.</p>
<p>For that reason, the girls did not need words to share their mutual horror when news of the mass executions by Governor Kodos on Tarsus IV reached Earth. They were ashamed beyond speech that their father had used their welfare to justify his affiliation with a murderer. The twins felt sullied at having gone to lessons and birthday parties with the Kodos family. Without preamble, they tore through closets and PADDs, searching for any mementos or holos of those occasions in order to destroy them. They were disgusted at their mother for not intervening sooner.</p>
<p>The twins fell silent with grief and guilt for days when their father committed suicide.</p>
<p>Many families of Tarsus IV victims, motivated by righteous anger, also searched for any information about Kodos and his associates, both recent and past. The Federation tried to control the information stream, but much of it, especially pre-Tarsus, was in private hands. Some families gave information to the authorities. Other families, outraged that the Federation had failed to supervise the colony, sold information to vigilante groups. There was a small black market in commemorative holos, party invitations, and comms involving the Kodos family before the disaster. Of the individuals identified in such personal items, most had followed Kodos to Tarsus IV. A few, like the David McCoy family, remained Earth-side.</p>
<p>One vigilante group, self-styled the Justice Project for Tarsus, became aware of the McCoy family’s former association with the Kodos family through a party invitation, verified by a dated holo of the families together. Without David available for their reprisal, they found new targets in his widow and daughters. When the threats began<em> (“We know the company you kept. You will keep it in perdition.”), </em>shields and other security measures at the Homestead and the twins’ college apartment were upgraded. Tragically, such precautions were merely inconveniences to the vigilantes, since they had already infiltrated the private security firm hired by Eleanora to transport the girls back and forth to university during breaks.</p>
<p>As habitual overachievers, the McCoy twins had started college at age fifteen. Donna majored in literature and Leta was pre-med. One of the security firm’s shuttles was regularly chartered to take the sisters to and from Emory University in Atlanta. It wasn’t Leta’s favorite form of travel, but was definitely faster than a hovercar would be. After a holiday during their sophomore year, the year of the massacre, they were scheduled to return to school in the chartered shuttle.</p>
<p>Donna hurried aboard first, dressed in a crisp white blouse, instead of the usual t-shirt. She stowed her bag and grabbed the seat next to the cute pilot in record time. Donna asked His Cuteness to help her buckle up, then flashed her sister a shit-eating, you-snooze-you-lose grin when the pilot had his back turned. Trying to relax in the back seat, Leta rolled her eyes and muttered with a smile, “I love you too, Genie.” After a flight check, with Donna leaning into the pilot’s personal space feigning interest and fooling exactly no one, the shuttle took off into the humid southern air.</p>
<p>A few thousand feet up, an instrument panel in front of the pilot exploded. Time paused. In the emergency lighting, Leta saw the pilot’s arms flopping on either side of his body and Donna’s left hand dangling listlessly between the front seats. Someone screamed and screamed again. In one of those moments of clarity that come in the midst of chaos, Leta realized she must have gone partially deaf from the explosion. She knew the screams were her own, though she was unsure if they were out loud or in her mind. She clung to the harness straps as the shuttle plummeted and the world turned black.</p>
<p>Coming to self-awareness after the crash, Leta’s only coherent thought was the need to reach her sister. Leta unbuckled with shaking hands and dragged herself through the wreckage in the semi-darkness towards what remained of the front of the shuttle. It was a good thing she couldn’t hear the groans that came out of her own mouth or the squelching of her blood soaked clothes as she moved. Leta pulled herself up onto her knees when she reached the passenger seat. She let a tidal wave of pain crash through her. Donna was still strapped in and unconscious, slumped towards what used to be the pilot. Leta’s mouth fell open at the sight of an object protruding from Donna’s chest, surrounded by so much blood that her white shirt appeared black in the dim lighting. In that moment, Leta knew that medics would arrive too late to save her sister, her friend, her companion. Leta also knew that the pain of her own physical injuries was as nothing compared to the agony of her breaking heart. As Donna passed beyond all aid, Leta took her still hand, caressed it and kissed it. She whispered with her mouth against Donna’s skin so she could feel her own lips moving, to be sure she said the words despite her deafness, “Good night, sweet princess, and flights of angels sing thee to thy rest."</p>
<p>_________________</p>
<p>At her sister’s graveside service, Leta stood stiffly next to her mother. Her stiffness was only partially related to newly healed muscle and bone. The physical recovery was going far better than the family recovery. Like her mother, Leta was dressed in black. Unlike her mother, Leta did not cry, <em>refused </em>to cry. As far as Leta was concerned at the time, her mother did not deserve to give or receive comfort, a view borne by an anger so raw that it could not be expressed in words, only in the aloofness of her posture.</p>
<p>Eleanora’s soft sobs and the cadence of an ancient ritual were lost in a wave of rustling, as breezes passed through the trees surrounding the serene cemetery gardens. All Leta could hear distinctly was the shrill cry of a hawk overhead, echoing the endless internal replay of her own screams as the shuttle fell.</p>
<p>Immediately after the funeral, Leta left the Homestead, driving herself to Emory by hovercar. Everybody in the family, except one, tried to persuade Leta not to go alone. One of the vigilantes was still at large. Uncle Darren knew there was no use fighting with McCoy stubbornness when experience seemed to justify it. His niece’s scathing words to him were, “So, a security firm is gonna protect me the way they protected Donna? I’d do better myself.” He couldn’t gainsay that without sounding like a fool. Darren gave his niece some personal security suggestions, in addition to the basic measures she already knew. He was the only one she’d listen to.</p>
<p>One of the few topics Leta agreed with her mother about, although not in a convivial way, was refusing the ultimate protection of a new identity courtesy of the Federation Security Agency. A new identity would mean never speaking of Donna out loud again or visiting her grave. Leta left the Homestead shouting, “I won’t murder her memory!"</p>
<p>Back at college, Leta briefly considered changing her major and not becoming a physician like her father. She decided no way in hell she would let him reach from the grave and take away something else she loved. Leta resolved to become a <em>better</em> physician than her father, concerned about people, not prestige or power or the past. She also resolved to do it without his posthumous help. In an exorcism of her father’s ghost, Leta used only her own wits and work to pay for the rest of her education.</p>
<p>When she gained control of her own finances at age eighteen, Leta let her share of her father’s estate accumulate in an account, untouched. At age twenty-one, when certain legal rights and responsibilities for the Homestead kicked in, Leta gave her inheritance to the McCoy charitable foundation for upkeep of the gardens in the cemetery.</p>
<p>Turning down her father’s wealth was cathartic, but it was naïve of Leta to think that she could just delete her father’s choices from her life. Leta’s Law of Ass Biting came into play: for every action to compensate for one bite in the ass, there is an equal and opposite bite in the ass. It came in the form of a crash-and-burn ending to her first and only serious relationship.</p>
<p>During medical school, Leta fell hard for Jocelyn Darnell, a beautiful and talented singer. The two small town eastern Georgia girls met in a big city Atlanta bar during a break between Jocelyn’s sets. A common background was the basis of flirting, which led to dating, which led to Leta attending every one of Joce’s gigs she could squeeze into her med school schedule. Jocelyn’s <em>joie de vivre</em> was a balm to Leta’s painful emotional scar tissue. A delightful bonus came in the form of Joce’s little girl, Joanna, whom Leta loved as her own. Leta and Joanna became a fixture together backstage, playing, reading, and napping together to the sound of Jocelyn’s dulcet voice.</p>
<p>Sadly, like so many young lovers from time immemorial, Leta was blinded by infatuation to the warning signs of a relationship at cross purposes. Leta was the earth, solid and nurturing. Jocelyn was the breeze, soothing and carefree. But the earth does not remain unchanged and the breeze is the harbinger of a storm.</p>
<p>On the day she signed the documents to be divested of her father’s estate, Leta told herself she was finally free of his influence. The young, soon-to-be-doctor was elated to be on a professional path, trauma surgery, not pursued or paid for by her father. She was also determined to be on a personal path, creating her own family, without reference to him.</p>
<p>Hard work paid for a ring and a private room at a favorite restaurant. Desire fueled a declaration of devotion. Passion articulated a life together, not beholden to society’s expectations of Leta as an heiress. Commitment brought her to one knee. Hope inspired the question of a lifetime.</p>
<p>Jocelyn said, “No."</p>
<p>As she refused Leta’s proposal, Joce argued that she had a good reason. Jocelyn needed a spouse who could provide financial security for her and Joanna. She never thought Leta would go through with throwing away a fortune. How could Leta do that when she wasn’t even a full-fledged surgeon yet? How could Leta turn away money at all? Clearly, Leta was either irresponsible or insane and Joanna should not be influenced by her.</p>
<p>Leta stood up, her dessert untouched, and asked the maître d’ to donate the unopened bottle of champagne anonymously to the 100<sup>th</sup> birthday party in the corner before walking to the bar.</p>
<p>If Jocelyn thought that brutal honesty would shock Leta into changing her mind about the inheritance, she hadn’t taken the adamantine McCoy resolve into account. If Jocelyn thought to strafe Leta with shame, so that she would crawl back for the salve of forgiveness, Jocelyn hadn’t counted on Leta using the oldest prescription in the history of medicine to deal with the pain.</p>
<p>That ring ended up buying a lot of drinks.</p>
<p>Leta spent the next several months drowning herself in med school for the most part and in bourbon when she wasn’t studying. Numbing her feelings was necessary to perfect an I’m-over-it face, the face everyone else wanted to see. Fellow med students had heard about what happened through mutual acquaintances and couldn’t even look at Leta unless they could pretend that nothing ever happened. “Fake it ‘til you make it” was the sober side of a broken romance. It didn’t work completely because there was no getting over Joanna, but it worked just enough to get by. Someday Leta could be herself, when she figured out whoever the hell that was.</p>
<p>Despite the social awkwardness, Leta stayed at Emory for her residency. It was the institution that had put her back together after the shuttle crash, after all. She made an obligatory comm home after med school to let the family know her educational plans, but she still wasn’t going to live at the Homestead. During the comm, her mother asked about Jocelyn and was curtly informed about the breakup. Eleanora inferred from her daughter’s tone that things had ended badly.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, Eleanora should have thought about her daughter’s attitude before dispensing a platitude, “Jocelyn only wanted you for your daddy’s money. It’s better that you found out now, before you married her."</p>
<p>She really went there.</p>
<p>Throwing a patronizing stone at Leta McCoy, even if the truth, was never a good idea when living in a glass house. “Maybe if <em>you</em> hadn’t been paying so much attention to Daddy’s money, your other daughter would be alive today!"</p>
<p>They had not spoken since.</p>
<p>_________________</p>
<p>Throughout her residency, discovering who she was as a doctor gave Leta McCoy a reason to put her bourbon tour of the world on indefinite hiatus. Her patients’ lives resonated in the vacuum of her own and told her stories that gave her perspective. Despite her personal losses, the privilege of her life stood in contrast with so many others. Returning the favor, Doctor McCoy devoted herself to her patients, fiercely defending their health and their lives, even from themselves.</p>
<p>Self-inflicted trauma through foolhardiness was guaranteed to be the subject of the colorful “McCoy manner,” as opposed to the banal bedside manner of other doctors. When patients were cognizant, out of danger, and able to tolerate matter-of-fact schooling, they learned what to do to keep themselves whole and out of Doctor McCoy’s treatment room. Having been on the pointy end of Jocelyn’s barbs, Leta wasn’t cruel, but she didn’t waste time on being subtle either. She was a doctor, not a diplomat.</p>
<p>There was always that one patient who complained about candor, but the vast majority did not. Despite Doctor McCoy’s frank assessments (or <em>Frankenstein </em>assessments, as one of the orthos called them), patients seldom objected because they sensed her personal stake in their recovery. McCoy was especially drawn to situations where the universe proved itself to be a cynical sumbitch, so she could kick fate in the ass. Life wasn’t going down without her as a champion to fight for it and, more often than not, she won.</p>
<p>Unfortunately, there were times when the warrior was impotent and fate was unmoved. Early on after the crash, reading poetry was a way to remember Donna, to still share something with her sister. Later, it developed into a way to assuage feelings beyond words and contemplate nameless truths. New staff members were amused when they discovered the irascible Doctor McCoy reading sonnets under a tree, but experienced staffers warned them off. Everyone had ways of dealing with the inevitable losses on a trauma unit and those ways were to be respected, as long as they weren’t harmful.</p>
<p>Despite her progress as a doctor, and as loathe as Leta was to admit it to herself, something was wrong. She was restive and irritable and…afraid. Donna was gone, Jocelyn was gone (was she ever really there?), Joanna was gone, her parents were gone, literally and figuratively. Filling the hole in her heart up with bourbon would destroy what she had achieved. She had a close enough call with that during med school, thank you very much. Leta had a terrifying thought: would she become her father? David had lost his way as a physician. He had traded administering cures for administering credits and couldn’t find his way back to the healing arts. Lost in the woods, he had been found by a beast. His daughter was bound and determined not to make the same mistake. How could she ensure that? Doctor McCoy was making a difference in individual lives, which was wonderful – she wouldn’t trade patient care for anything – but she could hardly stand being in her own skin because it wasn’t enough.</p>
<p>McCoy’s snappishness was driving her co-workers crazy. They were thinking of creative ways to hide the body. Matters came to a head when the dining hall Chef interrupted the Medical Director’s lunch with a complaint about a brown-haired boor in scrubs who insulted the dining hall hush puppies. Going after her hush puppies was going too far. Doctor Know-It-All couldn’t make hush puppies half as good.</p>
<p>Being the cause of an MD’s spoiled lunch bought an immediate ticket to the personnel office.</p>
<p>Fortunately, the HR Director knew how to work with high strung docs. In McCoy’s case, she saw someone who never learned how to make friends. After citing all the standard language about professionalism, blah, blah, blah, she suggested cooking as thera-, uh, a hobby. McCoy was required to take cooking classes given by Chef that were voluntary for all the other attendees.</p>
<p>The first dish Leta learned to prepare was the crow she had to eat.</p>
<p>After the air cleared between Doctor McCoy and Chef, the two women bonded over food preparation. It was a new experience for Leta since she grew up with a paid cook in the household and ordered out most of the time since leaving home. She found that cooking was creative in the process and restorative in the product. It wasn’t a cure for what ailed McCoy’s spirit, but it made her feel less empty in more ways than one. More importantly, her intensity level with other staff dialed down below ten.</p>
<p>When McCoy cut loose for a pot luck Thanksgiving at the hospital, word on the ward was that the food almost made up for working on the holiday. Dishes began to appear in the break room about once a week. Though the jig was up on the secret side of Doctor McCoy, woe betide the staff person who openly revealed the cook behind the curtain! Calling out the food fairy guaranteed that treats would disappear for two weeks and the rest of the staff would not let the offender forget it. Ever. Gratitude was in the eating or, better yet, in constructive criticism voiced casually by the coffee pot to no one in particular, where McCoy just so happened to hang out on breaks. Come to think of it, even the coffee was better since McCoy took those classes...</p>
<p>Thanks to Chef, Doctor McCoy managed to finish her fellowship without becoming a victim of trauma herself, inflicted by the nursing staff.</p>
<p>When she became the youngest trauma surgeon in the region, it didn’t entirely surprise Doctor McCoy that Starfleet came calling, although she had never considered it as part of her career plan. Leta had been debriefed by the Federation Security Administration during the shuttle crash investigation. That crime was indirectly connected to the Tarsus IV massacre, which had been investigated primarily by Starfleet. Someone at Starfleet had a file on her or they weren’t doing their job right.</p>
<p>A Captain Christopher Pike visited her with a Starfleet Academy recruitment proposal. She didn’t make it easy for him. They had three conversations about career opportunities and educational requirements. Doctor McCoy didn’t relish the idea of more education, but four years could be cut down to three and she could still work as a physician during her time at the Academy. There was no better place to learn xenobiology and related disciplines. Trauma treatment on starships was its own specialty, with sub-fields like acute radiation exposure. Starfleet had the best pure research facilities in the Federation for the study of pathogens. Temptation tapped into the restlessness she had been trying to keep at bay.</p>
<p>Payback would be at least five years in the black, which wouldn’t be so bad except that it would force Leta to deal with lingering aviophobia from the shuttle crash. She hadn’t addressed it since her therapy officially ended years ago. She didn't have to because she avoided shuttles like the plague.</p>
<p>Joining Starfleet would end the luxury of avoidance because of the whole operating-in-space thing.  Passing minimum flight standards was an Academy graduation requirement. To add insult to injury, just getting to the Academy involved a group shuttle ride for recruits from the Iowa shipyard to the campus in San Francisco. Ugh.</p>
<p>Pike came armed with a treatment plan during their second discussion. Apparently, PTSD-related aviophobia was more common within Starfleet than they openly admitted. </p>
<p>For their final conversation, Pike and McCoy were sitting in a private booth at a fairly nice restaurant. Since it looked like Pike had a few credits in his expense account, McCoy made sure to order a fairly nice whiskey. Swirling the liquid around in her glass, Doctor McCoy cocked an eyebrow at him and asked, “Captain, why would I leave the potential for workin’ in any hospital of my choosin’ for the privilege of experiencin’ disease and danger wrapped up in darkness and silence?"</p>
<p>In an even tone almost as smooth as the bourbon, Pike didn’t mince words, “Doctor, don’t be disingenuous. You already know from painful personal experience what happens in space can have consequences here on Earth."</p>
<p>McCoy took a sip to try and hide her discomfort. They both knew she was unsuccessful.</p>
<p>Pike’s next point was as sharp as, well, a pike, “I know you’re not happy. If you were, you wouldn’t be talking to me for the third time.”</p>
<p>McCoy didn’t bother denying it. She took another sip and nodded in agreement.</p>
<p>Pike leaned in for the kill, “For you, it’s not just a matter of being a different kind of doctor from your father, it’s a matter of being better, being the best. The question that keeps you up at night is: where can I do the most good for the greatest number? The answer to that question is: Starfleet."</p>
<p>Pike commed her details about the shuttle for new recruits and left. McCoy slugged back the rest of the shot and stewed.</p>
<p>The next time Pike saw McCoy, she was stick fighting in a bar in Riverside, Iowa.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>Thank you for taking time out of your life to read my story!</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0003"><h2>3. Live Bait</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Back to McCoy's current problem.  Cue the hand wavy medical and science stuff.</p>
<p>In Chapter 3, italicized brackets are McCoy's thoughts.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Almost four weeks ago, San Francisco General Hospital’s administration had been more than willing to ignore Starfleet scuttlebutt to take advantage of Doctor McCoy’s skills at no cost. Social media posts arising from the Academy were about as reliable as the shape-shifting relationships between cadets, the subject matter of about ninety percent of the posts. The hospital promptly snapped up Doctor McCoy when the SF Surgeon General’s office broached the idea of community service and McCoy’s official background check turned up clean. Since Starfleet Medical had more cutting-edge resources than SFGH with which to attract top talent, hospital administrators were over the moon about talent attraction working in the hospital’s favor for once.</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy was issued new green scrubs and a hospital name badge the day after SFGH cleared her. She was assigned to work weekend shifts in the trauma unit, Friday night through Sunday, to give SFGH-employed doctors some much needed time off.   Some hospital docs were vaguely aware of a kerfuffle at ‘Fleet, but it had not been a problem for them since Doctor McCoy’s presence was loosening up the schedule and administration obviously didn’t care. None of the other doctors got too personal since McCoy’s assignment was temporary. As for the patients, trauma victims tended not to care what the doctor’s father did when they were, say, bleeding out.</p>
<p>Everyone cared <em>now</em>.</p>
<p>Now SFGH and the whole world knew that home-grown hostile entities were not ignoring the cadet gossip mill, they were monitoring it and acting on it for their own twisted purposes. These domestic terrorist organizations were no less cowardly, but infinitely more dangerous, than dorm door graffiti artists. Only four weeks after postings about the classroom conflict appeared on the Academy intranet, a group calling itself the Justice Project for Tarsus crawled out from under a rock, having been silent for nine years. The JPT took eighteen hostages in the office building connected to San Francisco General Hospital during Doctor McCoy’s Saturday hospital shift.</p>
<p>When taking the hostages, JPT activated a shield around the office building that blocked communications, transporters, and most phasers. In the demand statement sent to authorities and copied to the news outlets, they claimed to seek redress for the victims of the Tarsus IV massacre and their families, but the demand wasn’t for ransom, it was for revenge. The price of the hostages’ release was the surrender of the daughter of David McCoy.</p>
<p>Although official Starfleet policy was not to negotiate with terrorists and certainly not to give in to them, this incident was not under ‘Fleet jurisdiction and the regional security agency was under tremendous internal pressure to resolve it with as little Federation-level involvement as possible. Civilian security forces were highly motivated to show Starfleet and the Federation Security Administration how it’s done. There was professional pride at stake, after all. Starfleet got more and frequently favorable publicity, what with the shiny, new cadets, some of whom were aliens, parading through the Academy every year. ‘Fleet and FSA were able to tap interplanetary revenue to maintain facilities almost as shiny and new as the cadets to take on issues of that were, literally, out of this world. On the other hand, civilian security forces dealt with age-old Terran problems that generated considerably less sexy headlines. To get back some of their own, the agents working for regional authorities who were ex-‘Fleet or retired FSA, which was about half of them, wanted to show their former colleagues they could clean up a ‘Fleet mess with fewer resources and more grit.</p>
<p>Thus motivated, the Western North American Security Team, or WestNAST, jumped on the hostage crisis with all due dispatch. Less than an hour after the first report of a possible kidnapping, operation hardware was fully mobilized. The wing of the hospital connected to the occupied office building was evacuated.   A WestNAST command center was beamed and installed inside the vacated wing. Two individual shields were energized around the now-separated wings of SFGH. Immediately after hearing the terrorists’ dark desire, Agent Oliveras, head of WestNAST special operations, pulled some strings with buddies still working at FSA to get whatever information they had on McCoy faster than he could have gotten it through strictly official channels. Armed with the details of the JPT’s connection to McCoy, the WestNAST investigative team put together a picture of the Finnegan fiasco, and its portrayal on social media, that precipitated the re-emergence of JPT after so many years.</p>
<p>The FSA dossier and the WestNAST investigation also painted a portrait of a doctor with the guts to play a key role in shutting down the JPT, if given the opportunity. Everything about Doctor McCoy’s medical background created a profile of compassion for the less well-off, the vulnerable, and those in need, regardless of their circumstances. She had a history of going up against senior physicians or administrators when she believed decisions they made were not in a patient’s best interest. The doctor also had a reputation for a blunt bedside manner when discussing aftercare with her patients. Oliveras chuckled at a complaint about a prescription McCoy wrote into the official patient record, “Don’t be an idiot next time and wear a helmet."</p>
<p>The hostages were defenseless small fry that got caught in the wake after McCoy had been thrown out of Starfleet Medical like chum into shark infested waters. Oliveras believed that McCoy would take the opportunity he was about to give her to make the JPT rise to a different kind of bait and spare the small fry. His next priority became persuading McCoy to work with WestNAST before some Admiral Knucklehead ordered her not to cooperate. He wasn’t going to give ‘Fleet a chance to cockblock his rescue operation with regulations.</p>
<p>The alternative to not getting McCoy’s cooperation would end in tragedy. An assault on the office building to blast through the shield and kill the terrorists would require military-grade phaser rifles and other fire power that would almost certainly result in “unacceptable collateral damage,” security-speak for “dead hostages.” Some deaths by friendly fire were likely in that scenario. The remainder being killed by the JPT out of spite was certain. The military-style assault option was never considered seriously by Oliveras, once he realized he could probably get to McCoy first. Besides, there was no one better than a trauma surgeon who could understand the physical risks of Oliveras’ idea. Talk about informed consent.</p>
<p>________</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy had just finished a surgery when the first order to evacuate SFGH north wing was issued. All McCoy knew was that it was not an earthquake. A rumor circulated that there was a bomb threat by a family member of a patient who had died in the hospital. The doctor helped move her patient and several others to a makeshift recovery area in the south wing. She was charting post-move orders when the Medical Director appeared. With a cold face and colder voice, she ordered Doctor McCoy to, “Come along. You've done enough.”</p>
<p>Clearly, McCoy was being blamed for something, but patients weren’t going to suffer on her watch even if the MD had a stick up her ass. Doctor McCoy kept her eyes focused on completing her task, although one of Leta’s eyebrows took flight up her forehead at the way she had been accosted. She was a doctor, not a dog. The MD fidgeted as she waited for McCoy to log out of the charting system and dispose of her hair covering before following down the hallway.</p>
<p>On the walk behind her boss, Doctor McCoy didn’t bother asking what was going on. It was evident that the MD was already chewing nails about something related to McCoy. It had to be a formal reprimand, though doing such thing during an evacuation was bizarre. She hadn’t made any medical errors that she was aware of and fervently hoped to keep it that way. McCoy tried to finger style her short brown hair to appear more professional if she was being called on the carpet.</p>
<p>The hair was a lost cause, as unruly as her thoughts. The only bad thing that happened recently was the incident that led to her SFGH assignment in the first place, but the MD herself had cleared Doctor McCoy to work at the hospital. On the other hand, they weren’t headed in the direction of the Medical Director’s office, where McCoy expected to go if this was a disciplinary action. They were headed to the evacuated area...</p>
<p>
  <em>[Oh. No.]</em>
</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy’s heart sank when she intuited that Finnegan’s accusations were somehow part of whatever had caused the evacuation. McCoy’s trepidation increased when her escort changed in the corridor between the two hospital wings. The MD waved a hand to indicate Leta should continue walking and stomped back towards her office. Doctor McCoy was met by a tall man in dark blue clothing with pockets on the arms and legs, chest armor emblazoned with WestNAST on the back, and, the real eye-catcher, a phaser on his hip.</p>
<p>At the end of the hallway, they paused at a shield as a technician on the other side created a sort-of doorway. A weird tingly feeling skittered over McCoy’s skin as she passed through the opening. The officer lightly restrained Leta’s arm so that she paused long enough for an opening to appear in a second shield.</p>
<p>After they both passed into the evacuated wing, the officer escorted Leta to a familiar break room that was normally bustling with activity. Right now, her solitary footsteps echoed in the nearly empty space. McCoy replicated a cup of coffee and sat on the couch to wait, a couch she knew all too well from sleeping on it for the past three weekends. She smirked to herself at the recollection of a resident dubbing it the “McCouch.” The rest of the staff enthusiastically adopted the name and applauded Doctor McCoy’s epic eye roll in response. It had been a rare moment of camaraderie.</p>
<p>As the memory faded, reality returned along with Doctor McCoy’s escort. He was accompanied by a man in a similar uniform with the addition of a gold badge. The newcomer introduced himself as Agent Oliveras, the commanding officer of the WestNAST special operations unit. He sat in a chair opposite the McCouch with a low table between them. The escort guarded the door.</p>
<p>McCoy listened to Oliveras describe the current situation. Leta felt numb after hearing that her fears had come true, the cooling cup of coffee forgotten on the table in front of her. Questions swirled in her mind. Where had the JPT been for nine years? Why didn’t they try anything during her med school or residency years?</p>
<p>But such questions could wait. The welfare of the hostages was the top priority.</p>
<p>Oliveras observed the doctor for few minutes as she digested what he had just told her. He admired her outward calm, but could see signs of stress. She was pale and her eyes were almost closed in concentration. Her arms were crossed around the front of her body. Her shoulders, generally straight, occasionally slouched, as if she were trying to keep up appearances while her body could barely maintain the illusion anymore. A small part of him felt badly about what he wanted her to do. The greater part of him was sure that, after being told the traditional approach, she would insist on helping to find another way.</p>
<p>When she looked up at him again with those piercing hazel eyes, Oliveras described the military force scenario. McCoy’s reaction told the agent she was smart, direct, and – what he had hoped for – invested in an alternative.</p>
<p>In a deep southern lilt, McCoy cut straight to the heart of the matter, “We both know that’s not a viable option ‘cause the hostages are gonna die. Some of your own people would prob’ly end up as cannon fodder. I won’t have anyone sacrifice themselves for me, if I can do somethin’ about it. You wouldn’t be talkin’ to me if you wanted to go in, guns blazin’. You must have a couple of aces up your sleeve and I’m one of ‘em, but you don’t want Starfleet to interfere. What do ya have in mind?” Leta emphasized her question with an expectant look: raised brows, wide eyes, and a tilt of the head.</p>
<p>After Oliveras described his risky fantasy scheme for faking an exchange, McCoy knew why he was working around the Starfleet higher ups. They had proven that they couldn’t handle rumors, so they sure as heck wouldn’t be able to handle a highly unorthodox way of dealing with terrorists. They wouldn’t have given her the option of risking her own life to save others.</p>
<p>If the gamble paid off and she survived, there would probably be consequences with Starfleet. McCoy believed the Commandant of Cadets would dishonorably discharge her for not kissing any Starfleet brass ass about the hostage situation. She found that she wasn’t terribly upset about the prospect of being discharged for doing the right thing. Besides, the press would have a field day with it.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I would get my good name back. I can practice medicine elsewhere.]</em>
</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy also imagined that, regardless of Oliveras’ long shot, the Admiralty would cut their losses, since one of their own had created the terrorists’ opportunity for hostage-taking. She was sure the Surgeon General would be asked to resign. Boo hoo. To rub salt in the institutional wound, WestNAST had out-maneuvered ‘Fleet communications with the help of the FSA and had frozen ‘Fleet out of resolving the situation.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Serves ‘em right.]</em>
</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy believed that avoiding Starfleet was only one of the reasons for this private meeting. Oliveras had a personal need to confront her directly, to look her in the eye when she made her decision. It wasn’t just about consent, it was about being sure of her mettle. Was he right about her nerve, or was she too traumatized by her sister’s death and recent issues at the Academy to pull this off? Did she have a suicide wish? Leta wasn’t dumb. She knew why Oliveras wasn’t asking outright, but was describing a hypothetical scenario and watching how McCoy reacted. He needed to gauge if she had courage, cowardice, or self-condemnation. He needed to trust her because everything – innocent lives, her own life, and presumably his career – depended on her.</p>
<p>“Of course, I wanna save eighteen lives and prevent future loss of innocent life, like my sister’s. And I definitely wanna live through it to see the Surgeon General get his comeuppance. If your bosses are worried about proper consent, you know I understand the risks better than almost anyone. Count me in, as long as I get to medically approve what happens to my body.”</p>
<p>Oliveras’ smile was almost feral as he began to bark orders into his comm to lay on the next part of the operation. The highest priority was for McCoy to undergo surgery as soon as possible.</p>
<p>Assuming McCoy’s assignment was successful, the tactical team was still at considerable risk depending on JPT’s endgame. If the JPT was on a suicide mission, any of them not neutralized on the first incursion could blow up the building on a pre-set device or activate a timer to do so, although there was no intel to indicate that JPT had access to weaponry of that magnitude. On the other hand, JPT had taken all the agencies by surprise, so intel could be flawed. In any case, bomb sweeps would be sent in as early as possible as part of standard operating procedure. If JPT wasn’t on a suicide mission, they must have a conspirator with sophisticated transport equipment waiting in the wings. Oliveras decided to throw FSA a bone for their earlier favor and transferred that part of the investigation to them.</p>
<p>The first deadline for responding to the JPT was close. A so-called hostage negotiator began communicating with the JPT to buy time.</p>
<p>The Federation Diplomatic Corps would have defined a negotiation as “a discussion of respective goals and exchange of tentative commitments between parties for the purpose of reaching a mutually acceptable agreement, usually in a deliberate and incremental manner.” In this case, involvement of someone with the title of “negotiator” was needed only to create an illusion that would satisfy such a definition. WestNAST wanted it to appear that they had looked at alternatives besides a trade for resolving the hostage crisis, even though the reality was just the opposite, now that McCoy’s cooperation had been secured. It would have been a dead giveaway [insert irony here] for spec ops to agree too easily to hand over Leta McCoy. After the JPT reiterated its demand for McCoy with a new deadline, WestNAST put on a show of resistance to the demand for several hours by making counterproposals that were all rejected. Oliveras’ team had anticipated all counterproposals would fail while they were preparing McCoy and the tactical forces.</p>
<p>The exchange was going to take place across a pedestrian bridge leading from San Francisco General Hospital’s second floor to the same floor of the office building across the boulevard. There were transparent doorways at either end of the bridge and a transparent covering over the bridge.</p>
<p>The hostages would be released through a narrow gap in the JPT’s shield. To capture or “contain” (spec ops-speak for “shoot”) the terrorists, the shield needed to be destroyed completely, which could be done with an electromagnetic pulse. McCoy’s job was to carry an EMP device inside the perimeter of the shield after the last hostage was released, then trigger it while she was still outside the office building. To, hopefully, minimize nervous system damage to Doctor McCoy from the EM pulse (electrocution, anyone?), the device was programmed to induce stasis five seconds before the EM burst. Five seconds was precious little time for stasis to take hold, but the opportunity to disrupt the shield would be lost otherwise because the terrorists would take McCoy inside the building as quickly as possible.</p>
<p>Obviously, the terrorists were not going to let McCoy simply walk in with an EM bomb. They were going to search her for weapons. The only option was to implant the device and hope that intel was accurate that the type of scanner the terrorists had could not detect the device in its dormant state. The physician for security forces had suggested implanting the EM pulse device in Leta’s abdominal cavity. Doctor McCoy called him a jackass and would only accept implantation in her right breast.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I bet Jim would call it “Bones’ boob bomb.” Ha ha.]</em>
</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy had pointed out that needing breast reconstruction was better than potentially bleeding to death from a hemorrhaging spleen, if stasis was not achieved. Even if stasis was successful, a ruptured spleen could bleed for quite a while. Besides, disfigurement was an insignificant price to pay for the lives of eighteen hostages, including eight children. Doctor Jackass’ counter argument was that placing the device so close to the shoulder risked damage to the brachial plexus, which could hinder McCoy’s ability to do surgery in the future. Doctor McCoy sassed back that she needed to live in order to <em>have </em>a future.</p>
<p>The implant location thus decided, McCoy’s right thumb was chosen as the location for the trigger since it was her non-dominant hand, in case its activation would cause nerve damage. (Leta smiled inwardly, remembering Jim teasing her for having a south paw that matched her south mouth, with a lurid waggle of his eyebrows. His leer turned into a dazzling victory grin when she blushed.) Surgery was performed with local anesthesia to make recovery as short as possible. Hidden stasis enhancers, another McCoy addition, were inserted by catheterization into her frontal sinus and aortic wall. The chaser was a hypo of analgesic for the resultant sinus headache.</p>
<p>Feeling post-operatively off kilter, McCoy was paired with a physical therapist to practice walking without listing to the side, despite having a new center of gravity caused by the implant. It was essential to the mission, and her survival, for her gait to appear balanced and fluid.</p>
<p>McCoy had been coolly determined throughout the medical procedures, except for the “jackass” comment. Medical was her wheelhouse, so that subject matter had been familiar and comfortable, even if she was working on herself. When the physical preparation was over, Leta brushed back her hair with one hand, an unconscious gesture finally betraying anxiety at the gravity and unfamiliarity of the task ahead.</p>
<p>
  <em>[A little out of my terror-tory. Ba-dum-shing!]</em>
</p>
<p>The gallows humor helped Leta get a grip on her mental state. The time for doubts was long past. She pushed away her fears by focusing her attention on the operation as if it were a surgery. The hostages needed her to play it cool on the outside so she didn’t spook the terrorists. WestNAST was relying on her to keep her head in the game to detonate the device at the proper time.</p>
<p>Breaking through McCoy’s self-talk, Agent Oliveras stage-whispered for her to step up to the transparent doorway and wait for further instructions. The terrorists’ second deadline to begin killing hostages, if McCoy wasn’t produced, was now fifteen minutes away. The (fake) negotiator told the terrorists in a seemingly strained and desperate voice that their demand would be met.</p>
<p>Leta moved into position just inside the doorway. The terrorists could see her now and she could see them. Leta felt her heart race at the thought of being stared at by people who intended to kill her in the next fifteen minutes, but she tamped it down again. She wasn’t going to give the bastards the satisfaction of seeing her cower. She certainly wasn’t going to do anything to antagonize them and endanger their captives.</p>
<p>Leta understood the tactic of making her so visible. She was being dangled in front of the JPT to keep them eager and slightly off balance. Snipers and attack squads were undoubtedly in position. Any potential advantage for them could make the difference between success or failure of the operation, life or death for the hostages. This was fishing with live bait.</p>
<p>Leta’s mind wandered down memory lane to Georgia. After her mother saw the light about her father’s so-called friends, the girls had been allowed to spend a lot more time with the extended McCoy clan. They had been taught how to fish the old-fashioned way by Uncle Darren. When the twins balked at spearing a worm on the end of a line, he pointed out, “The fish has gotta see the bait, not the hook.” In the here and now, the desirability and visibility of the bait was not in question. Success all depended on the hook, the implanted shield disruptor, and Leta’s ability to deliver it under cover.</p>
<p>She wondered what Jim Kirk would think about her decision to do this. His was the only personal opinion that mattered to her. Since Jim didn’t believe in no-win scenarios, Leta – Bones – suspected he would appreciate what she was trying to do: maximize her chances of survival while saving the hostages and getting the bad guys by doing it in a way that was completely unexpected.</p>
<p>Serenity settled over her. Leta wasn’t living in the past like her father or overcompensating for him in a relationship with someone afraid of the future. She didn’t care about them right now. She cared about dealing with people in the present who lived by the antithesis of her oath, people who had no compunction about making innocents suffer and die.</p>
<p>She cared about walking across a bridge, facing the same bastards who murdered her sister, and preventing them from murdering someone else’s family. That’s all she cared about in this moment.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0004"><h2>4. Riverside, Iowa</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>More deep background in this AU.  Jim in the gym (part 1) reflects on how Kirk, McCoy, and some others met.  Italicized brackets are Kirk’s thoughts.  Like TOS Kirk, I envision him as something of a Renaissance man and he gets his Shakespeare on.  For all of you fencers and combat experts, suspending disbelief will be necessary.  I just felt like adding a little action since the first draft of this chapter was pretty dull.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jim Kirk was in the gym on a Saturday. The holovid screen was blaring a news program and he tried to tune it out as he worked out some frustrations with weights. He wasn’t really into bulking up, but a solo workout was for the best right now. If he sparred with someone, he would probably hit too hard. He overheard some gossip and that’s exactly what’s been happening to Bones in hand-to-hand class. It was too tempting to do the same to someone else.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Maybe if it was Finnegan…]</em>
</p>
<p>Finnegan’s accusation against Bones had freaked Jim out at first. Any references to Tarsus IV before that class gave him flashbacks. Natch. After he calmed down a day or so later, Jim became downright indignant on Bones’ behalf. Finnegan couldn’t be more wrong about her character. Jim found that out the first time he met Bones, back in the bar in Riverside, Iowa.</p>
<p>
  <em> <span class="u">Six months ago…</span> </em>
</p>
<p>In the club near the Riverside shipyard, Jim was starting to get a buzz on his way to optimal inebriation.</p>
<p>As usual at recruitment time of year, shipyard employees were joined by newbie cadets and a few older cadets acting as babysitters.  He hoped to snag one and shag one tonight. The cadets were all in nice shape because they had to pass physicals. Better yet, they would leave for the Academy soon, so there were no expectations of commitment.</p>
<p>He had been trying to buy a drink for a particularly beautiful cadet surnamed Uhura, first name TBD. Their conversation was beginning to go sideways. Jim was getting nowhere with the lady and two beefy recruits Kirk dubbed Cupcake &amp; Company were determined to pick a fight on Uhura’s behalf, a fight that she didn’t even want.</p>
<p>Then this tall woman in a leather jacket, holding a whiskey, strolled over from the darts into the middle of their developing drama. Her brunette hair was long on top, the bangs threatening to droop onto her forehead, and shaved at the neckline. Dark eyebrows accented eyes that looked green or amber, depending on the light.</p>
<p>At first, Jim resented the woman’s interference in his escalating conversation with Uhura &amp; the Assholes<em>. </em>Although Jim had originally been craving the adrenaline rush of a good fuck, he had already conceded to himself that he would have to settle for second best, a decent fight. He started to get frustrated when Mystery Woman seemed to be spoiling his second option too. Then she partly redeemed herself by dick-shaming Cupcake and giving Jim her drink, which he could taste was top shelf bourbon.</p>
<p>With a southern drawl, Mystery Woman dared Uhura to show that she wasn’t a damsel in distress who needed to be rescued by the Burly Battalion and join her for a stick fight<em>.</em> Uhura accepted the dare with a smile and waved off her self-appointed bodyguards, emasculating them even more than the dick-shaming did. It gave Jim some satisfaction that the two cadets grumbled with irritation at the perceived ingratitude from Uhura.</p>
<p>Mystery Woman asked Jim to hold her jacket, paying him with another bourbon, so why not? The t-shirt underneath featured a skeleton with a top hat, cane, and cape. She paid the bartender for two pool cues and a t-shirt. Her purchases were passed forward by the wait staff.</p>
<p>Looking at Mystery Woman with more interest and a better buzz, Jim reflected on his appreciation of the attributes of all kinds of women. (Men were great lays too, but he wasn’t interested in a man that night<em>.</em>) Curvy women gave him plenty to hold onto. Petite women taught him that good things come in small packages. Ultra-tall women had certain body parts that were easy to reach. Some women, like Uhura and Mystery Woman, had athletic builds which suggested strength and endurance, qualities with obvious benefits in bed. They were also both intelligent and self-assured, very sexy qualities in Jim’s book.</p>
<p>Self-assurance turned out to be provocative all around. The dare had caught the ear of the barflies, the bettors, and the bored. Word of some impromptu entertainment traveled at warp speed. Most of the patrons moved to the edges of the dance floor to watch.</p>
<p>In the middle of the improvised ring, the two women discussed ground rules. Sparring level of force only since this was supposed to be for fun. No throat or head shots of any kind. No stabbing, especially to the gut. Stop immediately if one of them asked. Mystery Woman said a few words for Uhura’s ears only.</p>
<p>The Mystery Woman pulled a just-this-side-of-illegal knife from her boot, and how hot was that? She proceeded to cut a strip from the hem of the bar t-shirt, wrap the rest around the business end of a pool cue, and bind it with the strip for padding. She did the same for the second stick. She had long fingers that moved quickly and precisely.</p>
<p>The contenders took the sticks in their right hands and bowed to one another. Uhura showed off some fancy tricks spinning her stick, despite it being lopsided from the padding, and garnered some whooping from her fellow cadets. When Uhura struck out, the challenger parried easily. The women exchanged a series of attempted strikes and ended up in each other’s face. Someone in the crowd shouted, “Kiss her!” Mystery Woman pushed off to a few groans from the crowd and shouted back, “I feel like livin’, thank you very much,” which generated more whooping from Team Uhura.</p>
<p>Uhura didn’t let the mini-skirted uniform hold back her performance. Anyone in the room attracted to women had a good time. Cupcake and his buddy, now proud to back the more tantalizingly dressed contestant, did a lot of back slapping as the sparring continued.</p>
<p>Jim had been enjoying the view himself, standing with his back to the bar and facing the direction of the front door, when a tall man in a black Starfleet jacket entered the club. He remained at the back of the crowd, observing the match<em>.</em> ‘Fleet Jacket was trying to control his expressions, but Jim could tell that he was pleasantly surprised at seeing Mystery Woman.</p>
<p>In the ring, Mystery Woman’s moves gave away her fencing background. She was fast on her feet and had a deep lunge, but she tended to limit her lateral moves, as if she were on a piste. Uhura evaded with a sidestep, then swung her stick in at shoulder height on her opponent’s left. Mystery Woman switched hands and blocked easily, evoking a few ooohs from the audience at the unexpected move.</p>
<p>Jim noticed a guy with black hair at the edge of the dance floor who looked like he wanted a turn in the ring. His arms twitched whenever one of the women made a good move. He was talking to himself about the match.</p>
<p>Suddenly, things went to shit.</p>
<p>Five big guys dressed in black burst through the front door. The lead guy screamed, “Hey, Starfuckers! We’re gonna fuck you up the old fashioned way!”</p>
<p>Option two was back on the table.</p>
<p>Several things happened at once as patrons began running for the two exits behind the bar.</p>
<p>Mystery Woman yelled at Jim, “Jacket pocket! Now!” She yelled at the black-haired guy, “Sulu! Here!” and tossed him her pool cue. Jim palmed a hypo (a hypo?) from the leather jacket he had laid on the bar and passed it to the woman as he joined her on the dance floor. The two women, Sulu, Cupcake and his partner, ‘Fleet Jacket, and Jim drifted towards one another. (Jim and Cupcake were now on the same side. Go figure.) The baddies tossed furniture in front of the main and side doors. </p>
<p>It went without saying that, if someone from Starfleet didn't take a stand, the haters were going to chase cadets down for an unhappy ending. Evidently, Mystery Woman already considered herself 'Fleet. Jim just wanted his adrenalin rush.</p>
<p>While the scum bags were coming back together from trashing the place, Mystery Woman whispered to 'Fleet Jacket, “Captain, I have three doses of sedative.”</p>
<p>Never taking his eyes off of the enemy, the Captain said in a very low, but very clear voice, “The doctor needs access to their skin.”</p>
<p>The fight was on a moment later.</p>
<p>The I-hate-Starfleet gang generally had the advantage in size, except for Cupcake and his second. The Captain and the others had the advantage in speed. The Captain himself was wiry. Jim was a lean, experienced scrapper. Sulu was fast with the stick. Uhura was only slightly less handy with the cue. The doctor’s job was to look for opportunities to use her magic potion.</p>
<p>Cupcake and the other guy quickly had one of the bad guys on the floor. Doc rushed in with her hypo. One down.</p>
<p>Doc pointed out, “It would really help if you guys split up!”</p>
<p>Cupcake went to help Uhura, what he had wanted to do at the beginning of the night. No name went to the Captain.</p>
<p>Just as Uhura’s combatant got a hand on her stick, Cupcake tackled the guy. Both the stick and the two men fell to the floor. The men grappled. Cupcake must have had Greco-Roman wrestling experience and got the bad guy on his front. Uhura laid the stick across the gang member’s neck and pressed down.</p>
<p>“Doc!”</p>
<p>The guy was kicking, but Cupcake and Uhura held. The doctor pressed the hypo home. Two down.</p>
<p>Jim was being held up against a wall after having been punched a few times and his opponent was winding up for another one. Uhura ran over and smacked the bad guy with her stick on the arm that had been preparing to strike. Then she hit him across the back of the knees and he went down on his kneecaps. Jim twisted his body so that he had the bad guy in a head lock. The guy stood up with Jim on his back and Uhura wacked him across the front of his legs, right above the knee caps. As he went down again, the doc hypoed him around the collar bone. It wasn’t the most effective location and took a couple of seconds to work. Three down.</p>
<p>Jim disengaged. He and the doc turned around. The other “crew” had already forced the Captain’s opponent to back off. The two bad boys left standing took a defensive posture with their backs to one another surrounded by the Captain, Sulu, Cupcake, and No Name, all making sure to stay out of reach. Everyone was breathing hard.</p>
<p>“You Starfuckers can’t even fight without cheating!” The leader of the pack tossed his head towards the doc.</p>
<p>“It’s called intelligently using all of your resources,” the Captain replied coolly, maybe even a little smugly, after wiping blood off his chin with his sleeve. He gave the distinct impression of having enjoyed himself, but he had too much captainly dignity to say so out loud.</p>
<p>At that moment, Starfleet shipyard armed security personnel streamed in through the back doors, medics in tow. The two upright gang members were put in stasis cuffs and taken into custody. The three unconscious ones were put on stretchers with stasis restraints.</p>
<p>A Commander addressed the Captain, asking for a report on the fight.</p>
<p>The doctor interrupted. “Captain Pike, I need to discuss the sedative I used with the medics. We don’t know if these creeps were high on somethin’ that’ll have a bad interaction.”</p>
<p>Pike gave a brief explanation and vouched for the doctor’s credentials as a physician and surgeon. The Commander agreed to let her report to the medics first, as long as she returned to give a detailed account of her role in the fight.</p>
<p>“I’m a doctor, not a fighter,” she mumbled.</p>
<p>Jim chuckled, “What was that? Could’ve fooled me with the stick fighting, Bones.”</p>
<p>“Bones?”</p>
<p>“Your shirt, Sawbones.”</p>
<p>She rolled her eyes before walking away to the medics loading the unconscious perps into transports.</p>
<p>The Captain accompanied the Commander to an inner office. The rest of their party except the Captain retreated to the bar, which was the only piece of furniture left standing, to be looked over by the medics and give statements to security.</p>
<p>When Bones came over a few minutes later, the medics had attended to everyone but Jim. His knuckles and face were still bloody. “Why haven’t you been treated?”</p>
<p>“I don’t need anything.”</p>
<p>“Look, I’ve dealt with more assholes tonight than a proctologist. Don’t be another one. Let me treat you.” She called to one of the medics to bring an advanced med kit.</p>
<p>“OK, Bones, if you answer me a couple of questions.” She cocked an inquiring eyebrow as she scanned him. “You’ve been talking to Captain Pike about Starfleet. Is that right?” She nodded as she applied a dermal regenerator to the knuckles of his right hand. “Why? You could make a lot more credits with a lot less hassle Earthside.”</p>
<p>The doctor continued to look down at his hand. “I think I can do the greatest good for the greatest number in Starfleet.”</p>
<p>Jim continued, “How do you know Sulu?”</p>
<p>“Recognized him. World fencing champ with the sabre.”</p>
<p>Before the doctor could finish, Sulu piped up, “You’re Leta McCoy, as in: former junior world fencing champion with the sabre, aren’t you?” When McCoy nodded, Sulu added, “I’m sorry about what happened.”</p>
<p>The doc nodded again. Jim steered clear of what sounded like a death in the family.</p>
<p>But he couldn't help himself from needling Bones again. “So, you lied: you really <em>are</em> a doctor <em>and</em> a fighter, Bones.” </p>
<p>Bones looked up and eye-rolled at the same time. Jim just loved the facial gymnastics. The doctor huffed at Jim, “Touché. So, you know my name, but I don’t know yours. Believe it or not, I don’t want to keep calling you Asshole.”</p>
<p>“Aww. I thought that was your bedside manner, Bones.”</p>
<p>“It is, Asshole, but what’s your name anyway. Humor me.”</p>
<p>She moved the regenerator to the knuckles of his left hand and he fessed up, “I’m Jim. Jim Kirk.”</p>
<p>“Nice to meet you, Jim Kirk.” Gently, Bones touched a mini-regenerator to his facial cuts and he flinched at the light touch. “Your nose isn’t broken, but it was close. It’s gotta be hurtin’. I’d like to give you an analgesic.”</p>
<p>“No hypos!” Jim pulled away. At the doctor’s surprised expression, he explained, “I’m allergic to a lot of stuff and I can take the pain.”</p>
<p>“I’ll let it go for now since I don’t have a full allergy workup on you, but enduring pain is not heroic. Go to your own doctor as soon as possible.” She resumed treatment on his face while regen on the left hand continued. They both knew he wasn’t going to see anyone. “Stay out of fights for a while to heal fully. Regen sucks nutrients out of the body. Eat several balanced meals in a row, heavy on protein, and drink lots of water. If you don’t like vegetables, take a vitamin supplement.”</p>
<p>Captain Pike came over looking fresh as a damn daisy. “That stick fight was the last thing I expected to see, Doctor.” Jim gave Bones an I-told-you-so look. “You need to tell me the story behind it, but I’d like to talk to this gentleman while you’re debriefed.”</p>
<p>Jim scoffed, “Gentleman? You must have me confused with someone else, Cap.”</p>
<p>The doctor responded instead of the Captain, looking straight at Jim as she turned off the facial regen unit. “I disagree. You’re a gentleman alright. When those cadets wanted to start a fight, you wouldn’t’ve thrown the first punch. You would’ve backed off if the lady continued to say no, but they still would’ve beat the tar outta you.”</p>
<p>Jim realized Bones' interference at the beginning of the night was her version of the Hippocratic Oath, in stealth mode.  </p>
<p>
  <em>[Well played, Doc, well played.]</em>
</p>
<p>While the doctor turned off the knuckle regen unit and repacked the med kit, she said to Jim quietly, “Let Pike talk to you. It’s your choice if you listen, but he does tend to say some interestin’ things.”</p>
<p>Bones retreated to the office for debriefing with security while Captain Pike talked to Jim.</p>
<p>________</p>
<p>At 0800 the next morning, or rather the same morning by the time the talking was done, Jim was doing something he had never considered until a few hours ago: he was boarding the shuttle for new recruits. Jim had scoffed at the idea of enlisting in Starfleet until Pike said some interesting things, just as Bones predicted.</p>
<p>The Captain had confronted the stagnation of Jim’s life and his view of his father. He had thrown out a challenge Jim couldn’t resist. He had compelled Jim to acknowledge that Starfleet was an opportunity like no other to quench his thirst for adventure and feed his insatiable intellectual curiosity.</p>
<p>As he stepped into the shuttle, Jim was relieved at having something else to focus on than further uncomfortable self-reflection. He was pleasantly surprised to see Bones and an empty seat next to her. She and Jim were the only ones in civvies, presumably because they sealed their deals at the last minute. Bones must have spoken to Pike even later than Jim, after her meeting with security. She was sitting stiffly with her eyes closed.</p>
<p>Jim hadn't reached the empty seat yet when he noticed Bones' shirt. She had quite the t-shirt wardrobe. Today’s shirt was black with the phrase <em>“manu forti” </em>in silver gothic lettering over a skeletal hand holding a dagger. Jim translated the ancient Latin, saying it aloud without intending to, “With a strong hand.” It made sense for a surgeon. And there were more bones.</p>
<p>He was standing in front of Uhura, who raised her eyebrows. “I’m impressed,” she intoned. Jim opened his mouth to speak and she beat him to it. "No first name yet. You owe me from last night, not the other way around." Jim gave her a frowny face.</p>
<p>Bones didn’t seem to hear the exchange about the t-shirt. Her lips were moving. As he sat down, Jim realized the doc was softly reciting poetry.</p>
<p>“ ‘If thou survive my well-contended day, when that churl death my bones with dust shall cover…’ ” Drawn brows and clenched hands told Jim all he needed to know about Bones’ level of anxiety. They weren’t even airborne yet.</p>
<p>Jim hoped the doctor could get some therapy at the Academy or she’d wash out. He couldn’t imagine what would motivate someone to go into Starfleet while afraid of flying. There had to be more to the story than just “the greatest good for the greatest number.” For the time being, Jim decided to return the favor from the bar and interfere in a good way.</p>
<p>“Hey, Bones, can’t you recite anything less fatalistic on a shuttle than Shakespeare’s thirty-second sonnet? I think these things are pretty safe.”</p>
<p>Bones’ eyes snapped open. She turned to look at him. The pinched face was replaced by a smirk, but not quickly enough to prevent Jim from seeing a flash of sorrow.</p>
<p>“The gentleman from last night is also a scholar,” she inclined her head in greeting. “Hello, Jim. If you suggest verse that’s too sweet, I might throw up on you.”</p>
<p>“Should I be your Benedick and call you ‘Lady Distain’?” He challenged.</p>
<p>Bones rolled her eyes, clearly amused. “Lady Distain is for special occasions, <em>dick</em>.” Challenge accepted.</p>
<p>Jim pressed a hand to his chest and threw his head back, pretending to be wounded. “She speaks poniards and every word stabs!”</p>
<p>“The gent doth protest too much, methinks.”</p>
<p>“On the contrary, I suffer the slings and arrows of outrageous insults.”</p>
<p>“I would challenge you to a battle of wits, but I see you are unarmed.”</p>
<p>Oh, it was on. They bantered sixteenth century style for a while. Motivation to continue was directly proportional to the increasing annoyance of the asshole cadets from last night. The only one who seemed to enjoy it was Uhura.</p>
<p>When they ran out of Shakespeare, Jim saw Bones’ anxiety level begin to rise again. Jim wanted to avoid questions about his meeting with Pike. As the first topic of conversation he could think of, Jim remarked about her unusual first name. Bones let slip that it wasn’t as unusual as her middle name.</p>
<p>Jim asked, “So, what is it? Don’t leave me hanging.”</p>
<p>Bones cringed with her reveal, “Honorine, though almost no one in the Deep South can pronounce it correctly.”</p>
<p>“Honorine? As in the patron saint of boatmen? It’s like somebody knew you would go into Starfleet, Bones.”</p>
<p>McCoy looked at him wide-eyed. “You are the only person I have ever run into who knows that piece of trivia.”</p>
<p>“I am a certified genius.”</p>
<p>“Memorizin’ trivia does not a genius make.”</p>
<p>“Yes, but knowing how to apply it does.”</p>
<p>“Goin’ into Starfleet is not necessarily a genius move. You’ll need to prove it.” McCoy continued, leaning in, “Though something’ tells me you can.” Kirk smirked and winked at her. McCoy’s look lingered and she cleared her throat. “So, what is genius’ middle name?”</p>
<p>“Tiberius.”</p>
<p>Bones blew out an exaggerated sigh, “Whew, I remain victorious. In the battle for Most Awkward Middle Names, Tiberius loses, which is a good thing for you. It’s unusual, but not totally obscure, which makes it cool, and most people know how to pronounce it.”</p>
<p>“You just have a soft spot for Latin, Bones.”</p>
<p>She shrugged. “A hazard of being a physician. Did someone in your family love Latin?”</p>
<p>“It’s a family name, from my grandfather. What about yours?”</p>
<p>She paused. “My father picked it.” Bones’ drawn brows and the way she snarled the word “father” signaled they had drifted into emotionally dangerous waters.</p>
<p>With his naturally adventurous streak, Jim was debating whether to swim with the sharks when Bones proposed a bonding ritual, “Introductions including middle names deserve a drink.” She pulled a flask out of her pocket.</p>
<p>“You know it’s first thing in the morning, right?”</p>
<p>“It’s cocktail time somewhere, genius. Besides, this is some of the best bourbon you’ll ever taste.”</p>
<p>Jim couldn’t resist. After they both took a deep swig and Bones’ eyebrows relaxed, Jim realized that she was a genius too – at distractions. She was also right about the bourbon.</p>
<p>The flight was almost over. When they landed, Bones posture visibly relaxed. She touched Jim’s arm lightly. “Thank you,” she said quietly.</p>
<p>“You’re welcome, Bones.”</p>
<p>“I’m never going to live that nickname down, am I?” A smile – small, but noticeable – appeared for the first time. Jim saw the dimples.</p>
<p>“Nope.” Jim popped the ‘p’ sound. “See ya ‘round, <em>Bones.</em>”</p>
<p>He did see her around after admissions processing: in the library, in the mess hall, and in several first year required courses. Officially, Bones was housed individually because she was recruited as a working professional, expected to do shifts at the Academy clinic and, eventually, Starfleet Medical. Soon after the semester started, Jim was spending a good deal of time in Bones’ dorm room sleeping or studying, whether she was there or not, because his roommate snored like a Gorn with a cold. Bones’ only restriction was no sleeping <em>with </em>anyone in her room. As far as he could tell, she abided by the same rule. Later in the semester, he even ate at Bones’ place occasionally.</p>
<p>Ever the doctor, Bones carried extra antihistamines and epinephrine in her med kit with Jim in mind. Bones’ caution proved well-placed a month in, when the mess changed a recipe and Jim had a severe reaction. After that, Jim noticed a grade two scanner had been added to her kit and a new personal PADD on her desk was filled with research on human immunology.</p>
<p>Ever the McCoy, Bones spoke her mind when Jim got hurt in a way she considered reckless. The prerequisite for treating Jim’s wounds from bar fights was a dressing down from Lady Distain. “Benedick” became “dickhead” when wasted Jim showed up to Bones’ dorm room in the early morning hours, barely able to stand – sometimes not even standing – and telling Bones she should have seen the other guys. Yet, all the while her words were sharp, her hands were subtle and soft. She was care and contrariness combined.</p>
<p>Ever the friend, a reproof never replaced Bones offering creature comforts, with no strings attached. The couch always had a clean blanket and pillow, usually for Jim. When Bones knew she would be leaving in the early morning for a weekend shift, she bundled his drunken ass into the bed and slept on the couch herself. A glass of water and a hangover hypo waited for Jim on the nightstand or table. The coffee maker was ready to go. Kitchen stasis storage always had apples.</p>
<p>One evening, Jim commed her for class notes. After sending the notes to his PADD, she mentioned liking to cook when her schedule allowed and he could stop by for food if he wanted. Bones started sending Jim comms about the dish <em>du jour </em>and its ingredients, so he could decide for himself whether to stop by for a non-replicated, non-allergenic meal.   She quickly noticed Jim’s obsession about not wasting food and assured him any leftovers were eaten the next day. He knew that she knew that he checked for wasted food when she wasn’t around, but Bones never asked for an explanation and he didn’t offer any.</p>
<p>Since Jim wasn’t willing to explain his issue, he didn’t think Bones would be willing to explain why she had a hypo full of sedatives in her pocket at the Riverside bar. So, he would wait for the right time to ask her. Although her profession was about people, she had a lot of trouble letting anyone into her life because she looked at the world from behind battlements. That was something Jim could relate to. He figured that’s why they were friends.</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>McCoy’s t-shirt in the bar is a picture of the unofficial mascot of Emory University, her alma mater in this AU.<br/>McCoy’s t-shirt in the shuttle states the motto of clan Mackay (with the picture slightly altered), from which the name McCoy is derived, according to what I have read.  I certainly invite any Scots to correct me, if that information is wrong.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0005"><h2>5. It's Personal</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Jim in the gym (part 2), goes back to the current problem.  Italicized brackets are Kirk’s thoughts.  For those who might be triggered, suicide and physical trauma are mentioned in this chapter.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Still in the gym, Kirk was done with weights. Lifting had helped burn up some of his anger and think more clearly.</p>
<p>Jim probably wouldn’t be in Starfleet, in the Academy’s command track – where he <em>knew </em>he was meant to be – if it wasn’t for Bones. She had nudged him with a few gentle words, encouraged him to meet with Captain Pike. In that meeting, Jim found a purpose.</p>
<p>It was Jim’s turn to help her. Bones had been cast out. Maybe Captain Pike had been right the last time Jim spoke to him about Bones, soon after this shitshow started, but her exile had gone on too long. He knew in his gut that it was time for a change of course. Bones wouldn’t ask, so Jim had to take the initiative.</p>
<p>As he pondered his next step, Jim decided to try one of the new holo cubicles for a simulated run around The Presidio on a sunny day. Given his train of thought, the metaphor of his chosen form of exercise was not lost on him.</p>
<p>While setting up the holo program, the gym’s overhead vid screen blared FNN, the most popular news outlet. Ear inserts blocked out the news anchor’s annoying voice and began feeding sounds from the run program. Before stepping into the cubicle, he glanced up and saw a holo of San Francisco General Hospital on the news, making a mental note that Bones was there. Then he became absorbed for a while in a multi-sensory self-tour of the trails. He could even smell the ocean and feel the uneven terrain of the dirt paths.</p>
<p>As enjoyable as the run tech was, after the first few kilometers, Jim’s thoughts wandered back to what he found out about Bones’ family after that hateful class. Going over it would help him determine what to do going forward.</p>
<p>
  <em> <span class="u">Four weeks earlier…</span> </em>
</p>
<p>Even though everyone in Starfleet knew about the day Jim was born, very few knew about the days he almost wanted to die. Captain Pike was one of those few. The syllabus for <em>History of the Federation </em>class had listed Tarsus IV as the topic for the following week. Jim had gotten the Captain’s permission to go on a command track field assignment on the day it was scheduled for discussion.</p>
<p>On the day of the Finnegan incident, obviously the professor screwed up the schedule and Jim heard Bones get reamed about Tarsus IV for no reason, but he couldn’t stay with her and listen to the descriptions, see the holos. He just <em>couldn’t</em>. Jim ran out of the room so he didn’t blow like a volcano in front of everybody. Going through it one time, in real life, was enough.</p>
<p>Jim had paid his tuition to the devil and didn’t need to sit through hell’s classroom again. He didn’t need to listen to self-important academic arguments about the causes and ramifications of cold-blooded mass murder, made by cadets who didn’t know the definitions of hardship, heartache, or hunger; Jim knew the cause: defining sentient life as a commodity. Jim knew the ramifications: suffering and death.</p>
<p>Class dismissed.</p>
<p>What Jim couldn’t dismiss was the need to look into Bones’ story, even though he trusted her. He felt a twinge of guilt. That’s what Kodos did to people, eroded their trust in each other. On the other hand, he would never be at ease until he was sure. He owed it to his kids to trust, but verify.</p>
<p>Jim Kirk wasn’t going to rely on lowest common denominator sources of information. If her sister’s death really was a crime, then files with higher levels of security would have to be hacked.</p>
<p>Bones’ personnel file contained the basics, date and place of birth, parents names. He noticed that her mother was not listed as her emergency contact or next of kin.</p>
<p>From there, Jim found Atlanta-area news articles about Doctor David A. McCoy’s resignation, indictment for embezzlement, and exoneration (the smallest article, of course) two years before the massacre. An obituary for David McCoy appeared the same year as the massacre: “<em>David is survived by his wife, Eleanora (Thornton) McCoy, daughters, Donna and Leta McCoy, and brother Darren McCoy."  </em>David’s death certificate listed cause of death as opiate overdose, self-inflicted.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Oh, Bones.]</em>
</p>
<p>Searching all obits with the last name of McCoy in Georgia after David’s death turned up one for Donna E. McCoy, about eight months after the massacre: “<em>Donna is survived by her mother, Eleanora (Thornton) McCoy and sister, Leta McCoy.”  </em>Donna’s death certificate listed the cause of death as a thoracic puncture wound and acute hemorrhaging, accidental.</p>
<p>
  <em>[But Bones said her sister was murdered.]</em>
</p>
<p>Back on the FedWeb, a news article about an accident involving the McCoy sisters didn’t specify a cause. “<em>The McCoys were being transported by SouthSec shuttle, which lost control approximately 65 km southeast of Atlanta. Donna McCoy and the pilot, Tigan Damgaard, were killed. Leta McCoy was transported to Emory University Hospital and is listed in serious condition.</em> <em>An investigation is ongoing.</em>”</p>
<p>
  <em>[That explains Bones’ aviophobia.]</em>
</p>
<p>There was one follow up article noting that Leta had been released from the hospital and the cause of the crash was still undetermined. Attached to the article was a holo of the sisters together receiving their world junior fencing medals. They were identical twins. Loss of any sibling is terrible. Sam’s absence still stung for Jim, even though his brother was living on Deneva. At the same time, it seemed more profound to Jim that Bones lost an identical twin who was her only sibling.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I’m so sorry, Bones!]</em>
</p>
<p>Jim looked up the pilot’s death certificate. Cause of death was cerebral hemorrhage due to concussive force and acute hemorrhaging due to multiple thoracic puncture wounds. Concussive force indicated an explosion. The Federation Transportation Safety Board/Terra Division would have been called in first and would have filed a report. Jim found the report, which concluded: “<em>Interagency transfer of case file. Classified.”</em></p>
<p>Starfleet had substantial classified files about the massacre, including about Jim himself. He had only ever looked for information about what happened at the colony. Apparently, there were files about incidents on Earth related to the massacre.</p>
<p>Sure enough, Jim found a memo summarizing retaliatory activity by a vigilante terrorist group called the Justice Project for Tarsus which had resulted in four deaths and thirty-one injuries. A paragraph in the memo summarized David McCoy’s story. Bones’ birth year already proved that she was only seventeen years old at the time of the massacre. Even if seventeen was considered old enough to be held responsible for one’s political views, the dates in the memo confirmed Bones was a much younger child when her father supported Kodos’ career. The memo concluded with threats to David’s survivors by JPT and implementation of security measures by Eleanora McCoy.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Her mom’s security measures clearly didn’t work and Bones doesn’t list her as next of kin. Looks like we both have issues with our moms.]</em>
</p>
<p>A second memo confirmed that Starfleet and FSA took over the investigation of the McCoy shuttle crash under a joint task force dealing with the aftermath of Tarsus IV. The case file identified the cause of the crash as a bomb placed in the control panel by someone from JPT who had penetrated SouthSec. The investigation resulted in the arrest and conviction of all but one of the terrorist cell members. An offer of protective custody was made to Eleanora on behalf of herself and her surviving daughter. The offer was refused. Starfleet asked the FSA to monitor the family long term.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Finnegan’s from an old ‘Fleet family. I’d bet somebody leaked half-assed information about Tarsus IV.]</em>
</p>
<p>Usually, just thinking Tarsus IV threw Jim into a panic attack. On the other hand, thinking about it in relation to Bones, now that he knew she was indirectly a victim too, brought out the same kind of protective instinct he had had for his kids. Bones had been just a kid herself when her father got involved with the wrong people. She had nothing to do with it, but was paying the price anyway. He wasn’t panicking. He was purposeful.</p>
<p>The problem now was that most of the story was still classified. There were half truths and outright lies that needed to be fixed. The McCoy family needed to petition or file whatever legal action was needed to make the information public. Keeping these files classified was doing more harm than good. He needed to talk to Bones.</p>
<p>After Jim found out about Bones’ assignment to San Francisco General Hospital and she declined to talk, he had gone to Captain Pike’s office. His hand had hardly finished saluting when Jim got down to the reason for his visit, “Why won’t she see me?”</p>
<p>Pike didn’t need Jim to specify who he was talking about. Pike knew from his own observations that Kirk and McCoy hung out together. Frankly, he was relieved. McCoy was a loner and Kirk was lonely in a crowd. They needed each other to get through the Academy.</p>
<p>The Captain had been made aware of the Finnegan incident by the Commandant. Doctor Boyce had informed him of the Surgeon General’s action. Loudly.</p>
<p>“Jim, no doubt you looked deeply - maybe too deeply - into her background after Finnegan’s accusation. So, you know everything.” Jim nodded. There was no use denying it. “After her sister was murdered, the FSA kept track of her, even quietly intervened a couple of times. They let me know she was a good potential recruit.”</p>
<p>“What does this have to do with her not seeing me?”</p>
<p>Pike continued as if he hadn’t heard the question. “One thing that the FSA learned about McCoy is that she actually gives a damn. She really cares, even though she says it more in actions than words and the words she uses are impolitic. She cares about people as more than just patients. You saw that yourself back in Riverside. McCoy knows how much future assignments, especially command assignments, are influenced by recommendations. It’s the same in the medical field. McCoy wouldn’t want her being blacklisted to affect your future command prospects.”</p>
<p>“I don’t need her to protect me.”</p>
<p>“Eight other people, who are alive today because of you, would tell you that you’d do the same thing.”</p>
<p>When Jim didn’t respond to that, Captain Pike continued, “She also wants to show the Admiralty she’s made of sterner stuff than they are. If they plan to force her out, she wants them to know what they’d lose. The only way for her to accomplish both of her goals – protect you and shame them – is to stick with the current situation for the time being, but keep you out of it.”</p>
<p>“I was already in it. Kodos took care of that.” Jim ground out the name between his teeth.</p>
<p>“I’ll bet she doesn’t know that.” The shake of Kirk’s head confirmed that Pike was right. “Are you going to tell her?”</p>
<p>Jim couldn’t look the Captain in the eye. “I don’t know.”</p>
<p>“Think about it. Also think about the fact that she’s probably embarrassed, plain and simple. I told you she gives a damn. People sometimes do unexpected things when they care. Look in the mirror, Cadet.” There was no heat in Pike’s words. He had had a look of fond exasperation on his face. “Keep reaching out to her. Don’t give up.”</p>
<p>
  <em> <span class="u">Present day…</span> </em>
</p>
<p>Jim’s thoughts snapped back to the present. Enough running. He entered a cool down mode in the holo cubicle.</p>
<p>Jim was sure Pike was right about what was going on with Bones, but almost four weeks of reaching out with comms hadn’t changed a thing. It was time to change tactics. He needed to talk to Bones in person. To do that, Jim was going to have to corner her.</p>
<p>He had tracked Bones’ comm to the library Thursday night and to SFGH Friday night. She wouldn’t be back on campus for the next two nights either. Since she had begun shifts at the civilian hospital, she was staying there for the duration of the weekend. Jim envisioned Bones living on caffeine and nutrient cubes, doing her homework on a couch in the doctors’ lounge. On the other nights of the week, Jim and Bones had conflicting schedules and she had been trying to make herself scarce.</p>
<p>The cat-and-mouse game was going to stop on Monday, even if the excuse was just to deliver some actual food. His real goal was to talk, to tell Bones that he didn’t need protection and she had nothing to be ashamed of. She needed to do something to change the situation before this brutal schedule landed her in the hospital as a patient. She needed to put a stop the crap going on in hand-to-hand class for the same reason. He could help her file abuse complaints that ‘Fleet wouldn’t be able to ignore. Jim wasn’t going to let Tarsus IV hurt another one of his friends. Then they would talk about those classified files.</p>
<p>Having resolved on his plan of action, Jim turned off the running program, stepped out of the holo cubicle, and removed the ear inserts. He was startled out of his momentary disorientation by the words “terrorists” and “San Francisco General Hospital” from the news feed. He almost hurt himself craning his neck to look up at the holovid screen.</p>
<p><em>“This is a special report from FNN News. To recap what we know so far: we have learned that terrorists calling themselves the Justice Project for Tarsus have taken over an office building on the north side of San Francisco General Hospital. They have taken eighteen people hostage and surrounded the building with a shield. The terrorists are demanding one person in exchange for release of the hostages, Doctor Leta H. McCoy, currently working at San Francisco General Hospital. According to the terrorists, if Doctor McCoy does not turn herself over to them by 1400 hours local time, they will begin killing one hostage per hour. </em> <em>Why are the terrorists’ interested in Doctor McCoy? Who are the hostages? Is Doctor McCoy preparing to exchange herself for the hostages? Our team of investigative reporters are working on answers to these and other questions in this developing story. Stay tuned to FNN after the break for the latest information."</em></p>
<p>The holovid showed Bones in scrubs standing behind a glass door at the end of a pedestrian bridge, while the voice-over described the hostage situation and every detail the press could find out about her.</p>
<p>Jim felt like the breath had been sucked out of his body. Activity in the gym came to a halt as word spread that a cadet was on the news. Many of the cadets had met Doctor McCoy from visits to the clinic before the class from hell.</p>
<p>One of them called out, “Hey! Kirk! Isn’t that your friend?!” Her voice blew away Jim’s veneer of shock and jolted him into action.</p>
<p>In record time, Jim had run across campus and was standing in Pike’s office for the second time in a month. He was still in his gym clothes. They could all go fuck themselves if they tried to make him go back to his dorm for a uniform. FNN ran continuously on the holovid screen behind Pike’s desk. Bones was still standing behind the door.</p>
<p>Pike saw the thunderous look on Jim’s face. It was a reflection of his own feelings. This hostage crisis was ‘Fleet’s fuck up for not dealing with the McCoy situation openly and trying to sweep her under the rug. The Surgeon General would earn a special place in hell if McCoy died.</p>
<p>Pike’s comm alert had been going off continuously since the press found out about Doctor McCoy's connection with Starfleet and the Admiralty found out about her agreeing to a trade. In the outer office, his yeoman had already earned a commendation in Pike’s mind for successfully screening the calls. The press was trying every trick in the book to get information.</p>
<p>As Jim stood in front of his desk like a sentinel, the yeoman came in to announce, “Captain Pike, it’s Doctor Boyce on the comm.”</p>
<p>Pike tapped his desk device and almost jumped at the volume of the voice on the other end.</p>
<p>“Chris! Are you watching this?!,” Doctor Boyce yelled over the comm.</p>
<p>“Yeah, Phil. I’ve got Jim Kirk with me.”</p>
<p>There was a pause. Doctor Boyce continued a little calmer, “She was a <em>child,</em> Chris. She was not responsible for her father’s actions. Now, she’s possibly throwing her life away because Starfleet won’t back her up!” The strident tone returned. “What is she <em>doing,</em> Chris?!”</p>
<p>“WestNAST won’t tell ‘Fleet anything, Phil. They’re afraid of leaks and I can’t blame them, the way ‘Fleet let this whole thing get out of its control. But this has got to be an operation, not an outright exchange. I’ve worked with Agent Oliveras before and he wouldn’t just give her up, even if she wanted him to. They’re up to something. He just won’t give me specifics.”</p>
<p>“If she tries to smuggle in a weapon, they’ll just kill her with it. They’ll probably torture her first.”</p>
<p>For the first time, Jim spoke, “<em>She’s</em> the weapon and she doesn’t care.”</p>
<p>Pike focused his attention on Jim like a laser, “What do you mean, Jim?”</p>
<p>“Right now, she doesn’t have a whole lot to look forward to in Starfleet. People have been leaving nasty notes on her door.” Pike started at that, indicating he didn’t know. “Almost everyone has been avoiding her. They’re beating the crap out of her in combat class.” Both captains growled at that revelation. “She’s been told she can’t work on campus by the boss doc. She’s been shipped off to San Fran General every weekend so nobody has to look at her. Despite all that shit, Captain Pike is right: she gives a damn. She can possibly save eighteen lives. She’s not just carrying something, she <em>is</em> something. It’s <em>personal.</em> Sirs.”</p>
<p>“You’re saying she’s committing suicide.” Boyce’s voice was somber.</p>
<p>“I’m saying that whatever she’s doing, coming out of it alive is not her top priority. Dying isn’t a goal, it’s a side effect.”</p>
<p>Pike stared intently at Jim. “You mean she redefined winning, so it’s no longer a no-win scenario.”</p>
<p>Jim stared back, remembering a conversation in an Iowa bar. “Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean.”</p>
<p>Doctor Boyce’s voice broke the tension. “Well, dying is one side effect that’s not gonna fucking happen, if I can help it! Chris, I need the Agent’s comm number. Assuming Jim Kirk is right, I’m going to demand information on what’s happening with McCoy medically so I can coordinate transport by a Starfleet Medical trauma team after whatever this stunt is. San Fran General should be happy to get rid of the press magnet.” He paused. “Jim, I will do everything I can to <em>not</em> let Kodos kill another one. Chris, you need to fix whatever’s happening on campus. Heads need to roll.”</p>
<p>“I’m sending Agent Oliveras’ confidential comm code now. Let me know the inside story when you get her to ‘Fleet Medical. I’ll deal with the Commandant, but somebody has to address the Surgeon General’s bad decision. He put a lot of lives in danger.”</p>
<p>“That’s one fight I look forward to! Boyce out.”</p>
<p>After a few moments of silence, Captain Pike looked Jim in the eye. “Jim, no one told me about the physical intimidation. McCoy didn’t report anything, and I can imagine why, but the combat instructors should have noticed. If they noticed, they should have reported it. If they didn’t notice, they should be removed. I promise you, I will address it. There’s going to be a shake up in how a lot of things are handled around here, especially how cadets treat one another. If we can’t trust one another here, how can we trust one another in the black?”</p>
<p>As the Captain finished speaking, Jim noticed movement on the holoscreen behind Pike’s head and cried out, “Bones is starting to walk!”</p>
<p> </p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I have a love/hate relationship with the AOS movies.  Some aspects are wins and some aspects are, IMHO, epic fails.  As you can probably tell, I love some of the lines in the scene where Pike convinces Kirk to join Starfleet.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0006"><h2>6. The Deep End of the Pool</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>This was the first chapter of the story to be drafted, but Doctor McCoy compelled me to define the AU, rather than produce a one-shot with no background.  Thank you to those who have stuck through the AU and character building in chapters 2 and 4.  </p><p>A return to hand wavy medical and science stuff.  Italicized brackets are McCoy’s thoughts.  This chapter switches perspectives between McCoy and Kirk (indented).</p><p>This is my first fic ever.  Constructive criticism is appreciated.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Any organization made up of mostly humans, which intends to both commemorate and inspire its members, needs ritual to perpetuate itself. As one such organization, Starfleet Academy had no shortage of ritualistic occasions. An opening ceremony for the academic year, two assemblies for family weekend (no McCoy or Kirk family present), and observance of the Kelvin disaster (no Kirk family present) were just three of the stand-for-the-speech events Leta had already experienced in her short time at the Academy. Human cadets learned quickly not to lock their knees during events when they were expected to stand at attention or parade rest for extended periods of time, otherwise, when they passed out, their faces were going to lose an argument with the ground. In fairness to ‘Fleet, many organizations Leta had been a part of placed a similar emphasis on stand-up rituals, they were far less demanding about deportment.</p><p>McCoy the surgeon didn’t have to consciously tell herself to subtly flex her knees and leg muscles, like some of the younger cadets. Even in the 23<sup>rd</sup> century, ergonomics during trauma surgery were still hit-or-miss because of the unpredictable nature of cases, by definition, so a necessary part of surgical training was how to maintain circulation while in awkward positions for unanticipated periods of time.</p><p>As McCoy waited for the walk, she knew the consequences of fainting right now would be more than mortifying, they would be deadly. Fainting would prevent her from meeting the exchange deadline and the JPT would kill someone. It was comforting that her surgical training could save lives outside of the operating room.</p><p>Another surgery-related skill, one that needed no training, was the ability to maintain intense concentration longer than most people.</p><p>Child-Leta, like many youngsters, blocked out the world when she was fixated on something. At the time, she didn’t have a name for it, of course. Leta knew she was doing it by how other people reacted, typically when her mother would get more and more insistent in calling her to dinner, “Leta! Time to come inside!” She knew she had been doing it for a long time when her mother graduated to yelling her middle name, “Leta <em>Honorine</em>! Get in this house<em> right now</em>!<em>”  </em>When she was an older child, it would happen while doing things that were important to her, like studying or fencing with her sister.</p><p>Many people shed this ability along with their childhood, but Leta never grew out of it. Professionally, focus was sharp like a laser scalpel during surgery, particularly with complex procedures. Pathogen research demanded it for safety, regardless of results.</p><p>Outstanding athletes have experienced states of hyper-concentration, and coaches had been trying to capture lightning in a bottle, since sport was invented. This high-performance state of mind has been given different names – the zone, the flow, the fire – depending on the current zeitgeist.</p><p>Some people in the flow perceived time slowing down. For Leta, time in the flow didn’t change speed, it gained depth, like diving in deeper water. At the moment, having jettisoned concerns for anything other than the walk, Leta McCoy was about to go into the deep end of the pool.</p><p>__________________</p><p>It was quiet.</p><p>As she stood behind the clear door that opened onto the bridge, Leta noted a lack of movement below. There were none of the usual hover craft or pedestrians. The outdoor cafés and sidewalk stalls were empty. She presumed the other buildings within a large radius had been vacated and the area cordoned off from the public. The tactical forces were, of course, concealed. So, after Agent Oliveras’ voice told Doctor McCoy to step through the door and await opening of the WestNAST shield onto the bridge, the only sounds of human activity were the hiss of the door, the scuff of her own footfalls, and a baritone, “Good luck.”</p><p>Waiting on the abutment, Leta could feel a vague tingling on her skin from the shield in front of her. She could hear the faint whisper of a breeze swirling around the structure. She could feel a minute vibration of the bridge deck. Beyond a shimmer, she could see the blue sky, vibrant like Jim’s eyes. </p><p>The thought of Jim and his loyalty gave her hope.  It wasn't a gift he gave lightly.</p><p>The shield opened like an iris and she stepped through. A tingle on her back told her that it had closed behind her. She could see five terrorists through the transparent door on the far side, dressed in black tactical clothing with hoods, each one armed with a phaser on their hip or in their hand. From their outlines and profiles, they all appeared to be human, although that was not a certainty. Three of them were shifting impatiently from side to side. Leta took a deep breath and blew it out through her mouth.</p><p>Just as she was about to begin the walk across, a blackbird flew over to a ledge on the outer wall of the hospital. The movement caught her eye and she turned her head towards it briefly as her forward momentum came to an abrupt halt. The bird looked right at her.</p><p>
  <em>[There’s an old song about a blackbird, isn’t there? “You were only waiting for this moment to arise.” Indeed.] </em>
</p><p>The corner of her mouth lifted in a half smile. Leta squared her shoulders, paused, and looked towards her destination at the end of the span.</p><p>A holo of that moment was all over the news feeds by evening. Leta H. McCoy, M.D., Starfleet cadet, lifting her brow expectantly, holding her shoulders back proudly, looking ahead to an unknown future, but ready to give herself up for the sake of others, and smiling about it.</p><p>It became Starfleet’s most successful recruitment holo for the next two years, which later saved Doctor McCoy’s career.</p><p>
  <em>[Well, it’s time to jump in with both feet.]</em>
</p><p>Walking smoothly, as the physical therapist had taught her, controlling her center of gravity without hesitating, Leta strode forward on the right-hand side of the bridge. The hostages would cross to safety on her left. In the flow, Doctor McCoy adopted the surgeon’s professional demeanor, calm, confident, and compassionate. The hostages, traumatized enough already, at least would not be further undermined by a rescuer appearing unsure of herself.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>In Pike’s office, the Captain and Jim were transfixed by the vid of Leta McCoy beginning her walk. The entire building was silent as personnel of all ranks stopped what they were doing to view it on their own screens and comms. The campus had come to a virtual standstill. Even the news anchor’s usually incessant babble ceased.</p><p>As he watched, Jim realized he had never known the true meaning of the word “saunter” before. He had seen both women and men walk with a sway that paraded their sexuality. He had done it himself on numerous occasions. This was different. Bones was taking her time, but not hesitating. She was placing her feet deliberately, but not stomping as if she were forced. Her arms were at her sides, not tense, but controlled. Her fingers were extended, not trembling, but steady. There was a very slight roll of the shoulders, a <em>soup</em><em>çon </em>of swagger. Self-assured, but not sexual. It was almost mesmerizing.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>McCoy could see movement among the terrorists, a shuffling of bodies and snatches of color amidst the black. A gap appeared in the shield, looking like a curtain pulled aside, just wide enough for the first hostages to squeeze through.</p><p>As they were shoved through the narrow opening, Leta could see a young mother with a preschool child holding either hand. The tow-headed children whined at the unexpected prickly sensation of the shield, each brushing at themselves with the hand not commandeered by their mother.</p><p>Leta counted the hostages in her head.</p><p>
  <em>[One…two…three…]</em>
</p><p>The woman’s brown hair was disheveled. Leta could imagine both children clinging to her neck and the lady clutching them to her shoulders when they were initially taken, in a vain attempt to screen out a view of their captors. All three had tear-stained faces. The brightly colored clothing of childhood was in obscene contrast to what they had been through, what they were still going through.</p><p>As she helped the children take small, but hurried, steps towards the end of their nightmare, the mother repeated all manner of soft assurances over and over. She had to resort to bribery as one child tried to throw himself down on the deck in his exhaustion. Mom practically dragged him upright and promised they would both get ice cream on the other side, if they were good.</p><p>The mom was so preoccupied with her children, she didn’t seem to notice Leta walk past them at a measured pace.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim spoke softly. It seemed irreverent to speak in a normal tone of voice when something extraordinary was happening to someone he cared about. “She’s going to neutralize that shield. I just don’t know how.” Pike nodded in agreement.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>About a quarter of the way across, McCoy saw a silver-haired elderly woman being pushed through a second shield opening, the force of the shove evidently serving as punishment for her initial recoil from the static. The woman grabbed the inner railing of the wall for support after she staggered onto the bridge. A middle-aged woman plunged after the elder with an audible grunt at the shield’s unpleasantness. The shield gap closed after her. She grasped the old lady’s shoulders to prevent her from falling. Both were breathing hard for a few moments as they leaned on the railing.</p><p>
  <em>[Four…five…]</em>
</p><p>Leta resisted the urge to run up to the women. She needed to literally pace herself, to allow enough time for the other thirteen hostages to be released. The middle-aged woman linked arms with the older one and made sure that her frail companion continued to hold onto the railing as they started walking.</p><p>When Doctor McCoy reached them, she was unable to suppress her nurturing drive and asked both women if they were able to make it to the hospital. The younger of the two turned towards the doctor with moist eyes and said, “We’re all right now. We’ll pray for you.” The two women did not stop and neither did Leta.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim saw Bones say a few words to the older women. He would have bet Bones was asking about their welfare while she was putting herself in harm’s way. He shook his head at the thought.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>In contrast to the women, a young male couple practically dashed through the next breach despite it being too short for the men, making them bend down. When the first one straightened to his full height, McCoy understood their rush. The young father held an infant to his chest.</p><p>
  <em>[Six…seven…eight…]</em>
</p><p>Drawn by the baby’s sudden cries at the unpleasant tingle, Leta was unable to tear her gaze away from the little one as the dads came towards her. A wave of warm feeling, knowing that the child now had a future, threatened to drown her focus at first, then gave it new life. The family passed her at the halfway point and the dads mouthed, “Thank you.” Leta nodded in return as she walked on.</p><p>McCoy heard the muted sounds of a scuffle behind the black-clad figures guarding their shield. Suddenly, two terrorists pushed a large middle-aged man and two pre-teen girls out onto the bridge.</p><p>
  <em>[Nine…Ten…eleven…]</em>
</p><p>The man was red faced and his fists were clenched, as if he had been attempting to fight with the kidnappers touching his daughters. The girls screeched at a glass-shattering pitch as they passed through the shield opening. She could hear the terrorists’ taunting laughter in response.</p><p>The youngsters held one another in consolation. Huffing out his anger, the father placed comforting hands on their shoulders and pushed the girls forward. They walked so closely together that their legs almost became entangled. In their haste, the family of three passed Doctor McCoy without looking at her.</p><p>Memories of her sister rose from the depths, but Leta pushed them back down. Losing it now was not an option. There were still seven hostages to be released.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim muttered encouragement from afar, “You’re halfway there, Bones.” To what end, he didn’t know. His inability to do anything but watch a mission unfold forced him to think about the dark side of command. If he wanted his own ship in the future, he needed to accept the sacrifice of colleagues, but he would never be comfortable as a passive captain, only letting others do the dangerous work.</p><p>Glancing at Jim, Captain Pike could sense the internal struggle, a struggle he knew intimately. Each captain had to decide what kind of commander they would be. It was a decision made every day in the chair. And he had no doubt James T. Kirk would be in that chair someday.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>Beyond the mid-point of the span, McCoy could see a few meters inside the door at the other end of the abutment, where the hostages were staged to wait their turn through the shield. Now she could see two terrorists from the interior walking behind four adult Denobulans, one male and three females, forcing the aliens at phaser-point to go through the door and stand behind the shield.</p><p>
  <em>[Twelve…thirteen…fourteen…fifteen…]</em>
</p><p>Three terrorists from the original five at the door fanned out behind the Denobulans, who were probably spouses, and started shoving them towards a new shield breach. One of the females came through quickly and turned around, trying to persuade her husband to join her. Leta saw the male’s face expand like a pufferfish in response to the aggressive touching on his back. When he stood his ground, the two other females each grabbed an arm and pulled him through the opening. They were all walking towards her by the time Leta reached the three-quarter mark and the husband's face had returned to normal.</p><p>When the Denobulans met her on the bridge a few steps later, all four stopped and gave her enormous smiles with their incredibly flexible faces. Touched by the sentiment the smiles conveyed, Doctor McCoy paused and bowed her head in acknowledgement.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim had a lump in his throat watching the exchange between the Denobulans and Bones. He had not been able to see Bones, much less smile at her, this past month.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>Almost at the end of the walk, Leta could see a great deal of shuffling behind the abutment door as more hostages were brought forward. Three heads of brown hair bobbed amid the black hoods.</p><p>Leta halted about three meters in front of the shield. Its fine glittery wall oscillated, as if possessed by snakes. She found it to be a fitting metaphor.</p><p>Held on the other side of the abutment door were three teenaged boys, their resemblance to one another proclaiming them as triplets. Six terrorists restrained them, two for each teen. Leta could see the brothers staring at her, their brown eyes wide with fear.</p><p>
  <em>[Sixteen…seventeen…eighteen]</em>
</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim tensed when Bones stopped walking. Three very young men surrounded by people in black tactical gear were inside the doorway to the office building. At least three phasers were unholstered. Pike tensed at the sight of weapons at the ready.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>A seventh terrorist on Leta’s side of the door held a scanner and, in a gravelly voice, demanded that Leta come closer, remove her scrubs and shoes, hold up her hands, and turn slowly around. The message was clear: Leta would be checked for weapons before opening the shield for simultaneous exchange.</p><p>Agent Oliveras had warned McCoy from the beginning that the JPT would probably ask her to remove her clothing to prove she wasn’t carrying a weapon, a striptease that would be filmed by WestNAST, the news services, and probably the terrorists themselves. Hesitating now out of modesty would create suspicion and jeopardize release of the last three hostages. Ironically, the past four weeks had worn away Leta’s concern about her reputation.</p><p>Anticipating this demand by the terrorists was why the incision for the shield disruption device had been cosmetically regened. It was practically invisible. She complied with the command, pulling off her shoes, then scrubs, and piling them at the edge of the walkway. Doctor McCoy’s long-time habit was to wear a short singlet under her scrubs when not in surgery. She left it on, raised her hands, and walked back to her previous position in front of scanner-guy.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Outside the door yet behind the shield, Jim saw a terrorist with a scanner who said something. Bones removed her shoes and scrubs without hesitation. She was left in her singlet, which left almost nothing to the imagination up close. Jim knew because he teased Bones about it whenever he saw her in one. If the terrorists were trying to humiliate her, it wouldn’t work. He knew Bones: she wouldn’t care one way or the other, if it meant saving the lives of those boys.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>Doctor McCoy did a slow 360° turn and waited. She also hoped the Federation intel about the terrorists’ scanning capabilities was correct and the dormant shield disruption device was as undetectable electromagnetically as it was concealed visually. The delay was probably just an intimidation technique. Leta controlled her breathing as the scan continued.</p><p>Gravel-voice began to speak again, “I’ve been waiting almost ten years for you, Leta McCoy. You shoulda died with your sister. But good things come to those who wait. You thought the Federation would protect you. You even work for the Federation now and they threw you out. Now you know how it feels to be betrayed.”</p><p>He continued with a sneer, “I found some new friends in place of the ones they sent to a prison planet after I killed your sister, friends who hate the Federation too. They’re helping me take one of Starfleet’s own. Bein’ a doctor, I knew you couldn’t resist comin’ to our little party. I’m gonna enjoy this.”</p><p>
  <em>[So am I, jackass.]</em>
</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim felt a surge of pride when Bones stood tall, raised her hands, and turned around in place for the scumbag to scan her. The slime-ball with the scanner was speaking to Bones. This JPT trash was probably making a little speech about how much he missed Bones or some such shit.</p><p>Pike growled, “Don’t let him get to you, McCoy.” It was as much a small release of tension as it was cheerleading from afar.</p><p>“She won’t.” Jim made the statement sound like an oath.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>When it became obvious that McCoy wasn’t going to respond, and his “friends” were getting impatient, scum-bucket lowered the scanner and stood in front of the doorway with a feral grin. He gave a signal to one of the others who came through the door with a small hand-held device. The leader directed Leta to walk forward as two lines became visible on the shield, one line in front of her and one four meters to her left. An opening appeared on either side of each line, as if curtains were being pulled aside. The remaining terrorists brought the three boys through the door.</p><p>Leta raised her right foot and stepped into the shield breach meant for her. A stinging sensation moved up her leg as the active portions of the shield passed over her skin. The boys were shoved towards their shield breach from the other side.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim held his breath as he watched his friend step into triumph or tragedy, or both.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>When Leta felt the sting pass across her face to her ears and through the midfrontal plane of her body, she glanced to her left. She saw the brothers collectively flinch at the pins-and-needles sensation, but they didn’t stop moving forward. They practically bounced off one another trying to get through the opening simultaneously. After breaking the plane of the shield, they raced each other to freedom, their footsteps slapping across the walkway to the hospital. All of the hostages were now safe.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim couldn’t stop himself from speaking aloud, even if Bones couldn’t hear him, “You did it, Bones. You saved them. Now save yourself.”</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>The knowledge that all of the hostages were free overwhelmed her like seeing the baby earlier had threatened to do. She staggered the last two steps. McCoy hoped her little trip-up made it appear she was afraid, since it would look more natural to trigger the device.</p><p>
  <em>[Manu forti!]</em>
</p><p>Leta clenched her fists in mock anxiety, pressing together her right thumb and index finger as she did so, triggering the device as the shield closed around her trailing heel. The trigger hurt a little, but Leta wouldn’t remember the pain later.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim was an experienced fighter. He knew a feint when he saw one. It was a basic lesson in hand-to-hand combat class. Apparently, Bones paid attention that day. What was she feinting <em>for</em>? Bones had the steadiest, the most controlled hands Jim had ever seen. She had extended her fingers for the whole walk, even when she held them up, except for a few seconds ago. Jim didn’t believe Bones lost her nerve, not at this point. He said to Captain Pike, “Something’s embedded in her hand or her arm. I was right: she is the weapon.”</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>After her stumble, McCoy drew herself up just inside the shield wall. There was a breathless pause. She had one last thought before drowning in the deep end of the pool, when stasis suspended her brain and her heart.</p><p>
  <em>[Take the bait, you bastards.]</em>
</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim’s own hands were clenched at his sides. Pike’s arms were folded across his chest like iron bands. The tension was almost unbearable.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>The terrorists were hooked, two of them lunging at their prize and the rest loitering in the doorway.</p><p>On live holovid news, it happened so fast that it looked like magic. It appeared to the naked eye that Doctor McCoy was standing one moment, almost in the grasp of two would-be captors and, in a blinding flash, was down on the walkway the next moment along with the two criminals. Slow motion replays showed McCoy crumpling to the floor seconds before an EM pulse leapt from her body, engulfing her in light. In milliseconds, the pulse ignited the shield. Everything inside it – McCoy, the terrorists, and the entire building – was engulfed in white light for an instant.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p><em>“Bones!” </em>Jim’s exclamation was torn from his throat.   Pike’s inhale sounded like a hiss.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>Phaser sniper fire immediately followed the flash, lancing through the transparent walkway roof and through the now unprotected doorway. McCoy couldn’t hear the whine of the weapons or the crackle of melting materials above her head. She was blessedly oblivious to the smell of burned flesh, as the terrorists in the doorway paid the price for their conceit.</p><p>The sniper fire stopped. With the glitter of transport, tactical forces appeared in the middle of the bridge. The foremost person had a high-level scanner and protective suit to look for booby traps. Holding the scanner out, she walked slowly to the far abutment, picking her way among McCoy’s body and what was left of the others, and going through what used to be the door. Three other agents, two flanking and one on point, accompanied the bomb tech into the building with phaser rifles, in case any surviving terrorists suddenly emerged from the office building.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>As the scanning dragged on, Jim paced and pounded his fists together. This wait was even more excruciating than the walk. It was taking too long to get to Bones. He understood the need for caution, but McCoy’s gaping wound was sickeningly obvious. Jim fervently hoped that dying wouldn’t be a side effect.</p><p>Pike tried to sound reassuring. “Jim, she chose this. She didn’t let the hostage situation become a no-win scenario. She saved eighteen people today, <em>eight of them kids</em>.”</p><p>Jim’s head snapped around at the comment about eight kids. He understood what Pike was trying to say. It was just hard to be the one who waits.</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>After minutes that seemed like hours, the bomb tech gave the all clear. All but two of the troops remaining on the bridge surged forward and stepped around McCoy’s body to enter the building in attack formation, looking for additional terrorists. Not visible to the news drones, additional spec ops personnel had transported into the ground floor of the building at the same time, to squeeze play any terrorists who might have survived the snipers.</p><p>Two medics stayed behind and knelt down next to Leta. The holovid news anchors oh-so-helpfully noted how little blood there was because an EM pulse would have cauterized blood vessels, similar to a phaser wound. Nonetheless, FNN backed off from the close-up shot since it was an injury too grievous for general consumption, the right side of McCoy’s chest appearing to have been blown apart. One medic covered the exposed ribs with a field dressing and the other spoke into his shoulder comm as he administered a hypo.</p>
<p></p><blockquote>
<p></p><blockquote><p>Jim felt like he could breathe again. The medics’ actions told him that Bones was still alive. There was reason to hope.</p><p>Pike growled, “Come on, Phil. Show us what you’ve got.”</p></blockquote></blockquote><p>Immediately after the medic stopped speaking into his comm, another transport activated, this time bringing Doctor Boyce and three trauma staff from Starfleet Medical. They swarmed McCoy. After an initial scan, they started hooking up multiple IVs, inserting monitors, intubating her, and performing other tasks that Jim couldn’t identify. The number of medics around Bones made it almost impossible to see exactly what was happening until a life-support hover pod appeared on the bridge behind the group. Two of the nurses moved to activate the pod and place it into position behind McCoy’s head. Automatically, a backboard extended under her, stasis restraints materialized around her, then the board retracted to pull her inside, head first. After connecting all the lines, Doctor Boyce and his team closed the pod and vanished with it in a transport back to Starfleet Medical.</p><p>The exile of the daughter of David McCoy was over at last.</p>
  </div></div>
<a name="section0007"><h2>7. Her Own Terms</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Italicized brackets are McCoy's thoughts.</p>
<p>The additional 8th chapter is an epilogue I couldn't resist.</p></blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Just her luck that the first class of her first day at the Academy after release from Starfleet Medical would be <em>History of the Federation</em>, where it all began.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I’m gonna need a lot of coffee this morning.]</em>
</p>
<p>Leta McCoy sat half-dressed on the couch in her tiny on-campus apartment, enjoying – relishing – her morning coffee for the first time since the Finnegan fiasco began. She didn’t trust herself to handle hot coffee in a crowded mess hall and come out of it with a dry uniform because her right side was still weak. Dressing was a prolonged affair when every move had to be carefully choreographed, including getting used to a breast prosthesis, so she didn’t want to do it twice.</p>
<p>After coffee, Leta would put her tunic over the black undershirt and maneuver the <em>pi</em><em>èce de r</em><em>ésistance</em>, a soft immobilizer, around her right arm and shoulder before stepping out the door. The physician in charge of her rehab “consulted” (physician speak for “argued”) with Doctor Boyce about the sweet spot between too much immobilization and avoiding sudden shocks. They had reached a truce, at least for this week.</p>
<p>Having both been through the Academy, the senior docs viewed the morning rush as the most vulnerable time for unintended jostling. In Leta’s opinion as a patient, they were right, what with hundreds of humans scrabbling for coffee and most of the student body eating breakfast in the mess. The black immobilizer among a sea of red was intended to be a big fat warning not to come too close, like the male Denobulan’s face Leta had seen on the walk.</p>
<p>Current orders were to perform hand exercises and gentle stretching first thing in the morning, wear the sling during meals and class breaks, go without the sling during classes, and report to PT daily before dinner. The partially regenerated, partially transplanted <em>pectoralis major</em> and <em>pectoralis minor</em> would be reevaluated next week. The <em>serratus anterior</em> had been detached, but salvageable. Damage to the brachial plexus and median nerve had been addressed with peripheral nerve grafts, although the median nerve signals were still settling down as it got whacked from both ends.</p>
<p>Wearing the immobilizer was required for any recreational activities. “Especially since you’re friends with Jim Kirk,” Doctor Boyce had said. “And no recreational substances, including alcohol. You don’t want to ruin my good work by falling down from mixing pain meds with anything.”</p>
<p>Besides evading the wrath of Doctor Boyce, Leta wanted to avoid falling because, even in the 23<sup>rd</sup> century, six bruised ribs <em>fucking hurt</em>. She didn’t want a fall to worsen the sore ribs or tempt fate by graduating to a higher level of concussion.</p>
<p>She sustained a concussion from being thrown backwards by the EM pulse. There was nothing that could have been done to protect her head on the outside without arousing the suspicions of the JPT. Doctor McCoy had insisted on the stasis enhancers mostly as protection from the electrical current, but partly as protection against excessive cerebral hemorrhaging associated with the inevitable fall. McCoy believed she had been proven right because the concussion was limited to a grade one and her faculties were intact, despite a Jupiter-sized headache.</p>
<p>Agent Oliveras was relieved that Leta’s memory of the incident had been preserved, right up until stasis took over. Her sister’s cold case had been closed based on her debriefing testimony about gravel-voice’s taunting admission of responsibility for the shuttle explosion.</p>
<p>A milder concussion was also a good thing since central nervous system grafts were not nearly as effective as peripheral ones.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Hmmm. Sounds like a research project.]</em>
</p>
<p>Given that the head, shoulder, and thumb were on good recovery trajectories, Boyce projected McCoy might be doing simple surgery sims by summer. She could do the preliminary research on CNS grafting before that and work up to simming new techniques as part of her re-training.</p>
<p>
  <em>[I guess this is what closure feels like. One chapter ends and another begins.]</em>
</p>
<p>Leta got up from the couch slowly, her ribs sending a message, and poured a second mug of coffee. She caught her reflection in the shiny surface of the replicator and paused. She walked back to the couch, carefully placing the coffee mug on the side table first, before gently lowering her torso to the seat with a sigh. Seeing herself in the replicator reminded her that looking in a mirror was not her favorite thing these days.</p>
<p>Recovery of her appearance was a matter entirely different from recovery of function.</p>
<p>Doctor McCoy had known when she suggested the EMP device be implanted in her breast that replacement breast tissue was very tricky to grow for transplantation. A permanent implant might be the only reconstructive option. She had meant it when she told Doctor Jackass that disfigurement was a small price to pay.</p>
<p>Leta had even considered going without a prosthesis today for the shock value. It would serve some of those candy-ass cadets right to see her missing a body part and make them squirm. Part of her wanted to get a little of her own back for the way she had been treated.</p>
<p>In the end, she decided against it. One, the decision to wear a prosthesis was selfish: it was hard enough to look at herself while dressing, much less being self-conscious every second of the day. Two, there were other ways to get some digs in. Three, the smiling holos sent by the former hostages filled some of that hole in her soul.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Speaking of filling holes, what am I going to do about an artificial implant?]</em>
</p>
<p>Doctor Boyce had suggested Leta start thinking about what she might want to look and feel like, if the transplanted breast tissue fails. He could give her a box of sample implants to consider. Other than symmetrical, Leta had no clue what she wanted her chest to look like. Before now, she had accepted what nature had given her.</p>
<p>She had no females in her life to ask for advice. Jim was her only close friend. His ideas would be expressed in terms that would leave her blushing on the outside and smiling on the inside. Talk about making someone squirm. On the other hand, he could also be considered a connoisseur of the female form…but that was a path not to go down right now.</p>
<p>Most young women might call their mothers about something so intimate. Such was not an option for Leta – at least not yet – but Uncle Darren had given her food for thought about her mother.</p>
<p>Scratch that. He had given her a piece of his mind.</p>
<p>
  <em> <span class="u">Two weeks earlier…</span> </em>
</p>
<p>Despite his friendship with Bones, Jim had been restricted from visiting while she was unconscious because he had not been designated an emergency contact. It was beyond frustrating. Pike anticipated Jim’s desire to break into SFM and persuaded him to stand down. If Jim was caught, he would be restricted from seeing Bones at all and there would be disciplinary action. Jim took a minor amount of satisfaction from the fact that Captain Pike was also restricted. Pike passed along Bones’ progress to Jim.</p>
<p>When Leta regained full consciousness about 48 hours after the incident, Pike contacted Jim to let the young man know that Bones was asking to see him.</p>
<p>That evening, Jim was in Bones’ room congratulating her on inventing the boob bomb. If it hadn’t been for the stasis field holding her right shoulder, she would have fallen out of bed laughing.</p>
<p>Jim had been visiting for about twenty minutes when a middle-aged man about Jim’s height appeared in the doorway.</p>
<p>The man had dark brows atop hazel eyes that clearly came from the same gene pool as Bones’. His chestnut brown hair was also a familiar color, although the temples had a hint of gray. Most of all, Jim knew that way of moving as he came over to the bed. This man didn’t just walk, he sauntered.</p>
<p>After being introduced to Darren McCoy and vice versa, Jim said, “Good looks is in your bones, Bones. And I get two Southern accents for the price of one visit!”</p>
<p>“Well, aren’t you a charmer, Mr. Kirk. And “Bones”?”</p>
<p>Leta explained, “The first time he saw me, I was wearing a Dooley shirt.”</p>
<p>Darren grunted in acknowledgement. “And “sawbones”, right?”</p>
<p>“Yeah. Please, call me Jim.” That famous Kirk smile lit up the room.</p>
<p>The two men sat in chairs on her left side and Darren turned to Leta. “It’s about time I saw you awake.” He raised an eyebrow and tilted his head towards Jim. “And about time you made a friend. That’s the second good thing I heard since I got a call from your mother in hysterics two and a half days ago. The first good thing was Doctor Boyce sayin’ you would <em>stay alive.</em> The third good thing is you let the kid here give you a nickname. That hasn’t happened since your sister passed. Oh, don’t give me that look, Leta McCoy! She would be happy about it, ‘specially from someone as good lookin’ as this.” He jerked his thumb at Jim.</p>
<p>Her uncle was jacked up. Leta braced herself inwardly.</p>
<p>Sure enough, like the consummate lawyer he was, Darren proceeded to prosecute a case against his niece.</p>
<p>He pointed at her. “You join Starfleet with just a comm, not sayin’ a proper goodbye. The next thing we know, you’re blowin’ yerself up on FNN. I’ve a right to be a might perturbed.”</p>
<p>Jim’s face schooled itself into neutrality. “Bones, I should leave.”</p>
<p>Darren didn’t hesitate holding up a hand. “I would appreciate it if you stayed. I need a witness.” He didn’t give Jim a chance to reply and turned to Leta. “You need to contact your mother.”</p>
<p>Leta tried to return the volley, but she was in a weak position, literally and figuratively. “Isn’t it a little cynical to forgive her, just because I had a near death experience?”</p>
<p>“Bless your heart,” Darren said in a sing-song voice, “tryin’ to be all considerate-like <em>now</em>.” He leaned in and lowered his tone. “I’m not askin’ you to forgive her. I’m askin’ you to start over with her. You need to get off your high horse, Leta McCoy. Your mother made mistakes with your dad, sure, but she didn’t put that bomb in the shuttle. No one knows that better than you, since it was <em>confessed to your face</em>.” In answer to the question embedded in her startled expression, he returned to the sing-song mode, “Agent Oliveras was kind enough to tell me about it.”</p>
<p>Leta winced from round one and knew other rounds were coming. Darren was only just getting started. She glanced over at Jim. He was busy trying to become one with the wall by not looking at either of them, but she could tell by the angle of his head that he was listening. Somehow this discussion was relevant to him also. Leta’s attention snapped back to her uncle as he started speaking again.</p>
<p>“Your argument with your mother about Jocelyn was that she told you the truth and you couldn’t handle it. She wasn’t the only one who was blind in a relationship. In fact, if someone had given you a dose of honesty sooner, it would have saved you a lot of heart ache. But, <em>noooo</em>, you wouldn’t have listened. You should <em>thank</em> Eleanora for respecting your privacy until you learned the truth for yourself.”</p>
<p>Leta’s left hand fisted in the sheets and she clenched her jaw. He had gotten under her skin.</p>
<p>The counselor gave his closing argument, driving his point home.</p>
<p>“Eleanora watched you – her daughter – nearly kill yourself <em>live </em>on the news, but she couldn’t even come to your bedside ‘cause she’s unwelcome. That’s just plain cruel. You say you’re a doctor, Leta. Well, <em>be one</em> then and do some healing in your relationship with your mother.”</p>
<p>He got up. “I’m gonna leave for a while and let you think about that.” Darren opened the door and his tread retreated down the hallway.</p>
<p>Silence hung in the room for a few moments. Leta looked at Jim wryly and said, “I think I need surgery after that ass-chewin’.”</p>
<p>“Bones, remind me <em>never </em>to get your uncle mad at me. Seriously.”</p>
<p>
  <span>______________</span>
</p>
<p>Darren returned an hour or so later for dinner. Things were awkward for a few moments until he assured them that the previous topic was over and done with (“I’ve said my piece about your mother.”).</p>
<p>After ordering food, the uncle in Uncle Darren came out. “Leta, we’re unbelievably proud of you, even though you scared us half to death. If you hadn’t taken that risk, who knows how many more people would have been killed by that pond scum in the future, using Tarsus as an excuse.” He took her hand. “You can let go of your father now.”</p>
<p>Jim jumped up to get Leta a tissue for the tears. When she wiped her eyes, Leta noticed Jim’s eyes were red too.</p>
<p>Uncle Darren wasn’t done. “We’ve always been proud of you as a doctor. Starfleet won the recruitment lottery when you said “yes.” You’re gonna save worlds. We just know how dangerous it can be up there. A lot of young people don’t come back. Please talk to us more and let us know you’re alright.”</p>
<p>He squeezed her hand. She nodded.</p>
<p>All of sudden, Uncle Darren got up and began to pace. “Yep, Starfleet got lucky you’re a McCoy, but they’re gonna be sorry that <em>I’m</em> one. ‘Fleet didn’t want to clean up its own mess and WestNAST did it for ‘em, using you as leverage. I’m gonna have someone’s commission for that.”</p>
<p>He said it as if it was a <em>fait accompli</em>. Leta got the feeling that he had already been planning something after he unloaded on her earlier. It was some consolation to Leta that she wasn’t the only one who was getting harsh truths from Uncle Darren. ‘Fleet had pissed off the wrong guy. Neither Leta nor Jim questioned Darren McCoy’s ability to force a resignation or retirement, even though he wasn’t in Starfleet.</p>
<p>Fortunately, the food arrived just in time to divert conversation into less volatile topics, like the latest doings at the Homestead.</p>
<p>
  <span class="u"> <em>Present day...</em> </span>
</p>
<p>Leta smirked into her coffee at the memory. Between the two McCoys, the Surgeon General was probably feeling like a cat in a room full of rocking chairs. Two days ago, the day of her release from the hospital, Pike brought her to his office and informed her the SG wanted to give her a medal for valor in the performance of her duties. She flatly, formally refused to accept a medal from Starfleet.</p>
<p>Leta mentally patted herself on the back. She showed great restraint for not calling the Surgeon General a self-serving, heartless scumbag who didn’t have enough brain cells to comprehend his own incompetence and who was a blight on the medical profession. She seethed at going from Academy reject to darling of the ‘Fleet without so much as an apology from the person who had tossed her out in the first place.</p>
<p>
  <em>[Bitter bones? You bet!]</em>
</p>
<p>The Surgeon General’s comeback to her refusal was true to form: another threat to toss her out. Pike looked mortified. The SG threatened to discharge Doctor McCoy for not having asked Starfleet’s permission to participate in the WestNAST operation, unless she accepted a public commendation ceremony by Starfleet.</p>
<p>McCoy called his bluff, “I leapt before looking because the action was in keeping with the ethic of the Federation, even if Starfleet had not sanctioned the operation. Since the operation was not under the jurisdiction of Starfleet, I do not believe a Starfleet commendation is appropriate. I will accept a discharge, if deemed necessary by Starfleet Command. If Starfleet reconsiders its position, I would be willing to accept any civilian commendations in my Academy uniform and accompanied by Captain Christopher Pike.”</p>
<p>When McCoy finished her little speech, Pike looked like he was trying not to smile. The Surgeon General ended the comm abruptly.</p>
<p>Leta McCoy was a celebrity now and everyone knew it. If she was discharged for this incident, word would get out and the press would have a feeding frenzy about the cold-hearted Surgeon General and his minions. After that, good luck to Starfleet trying to recruit anyone for a “humanitarian and peacekeeping armada” that punished its people for saving lives. And word <em>would</em> get out. Leta wondered if Uncle Darren had already threatened it.</p>
<p>The Surgeon General’s office did not up the ante or respond in any way yesterday. Maybe she had gotten her good name back – on her own terms.</p>
<p>Until she knew for sure, she would just go to class.</p>
<p>Her door chime rang. There was only one person it could be. “Come in, Jim.”</p>
<p>The door opened. By force of habit, Leta checked for graffiti. There was nothing written on the door.</p>
<p>Jim sailed in spreading his arms wide. “Welcome back, Bones! Let us feast to your triumphant return!”</p>
<p>“I’m a doctor, not a holovid hero.”</p>
<p>“I don’t know, Bones, that was some kinda holovid hero footage on the news.”</p>
<p>“People died. I don’t feel good about that, even if they were criminals.”</p>
<p>“Bones, look at me.” She did as he asked as he placed a hand on her left shoulder. “Those people made a choice to be terrorists. They were going to take <em>innocent </em>lives, yours or eighteen others, including eight kids. And they were either going to die in a police action or they were going to transport themselves and take more innocent lives in the future. You have no reason to feel guilty.”</p>
<p>“My mind knows it, but my heart’s havin’ trouble catchin’ up.” Leta sighed. “Today’s gonna be weird enough as it is. People bein’ nice, who wouldn’t give me the time of day six weeks ago. Maybe I shouldn’t go to the mess after all.”</p>
<p>“You better get used to it. Rumor has it Chef made grits for breakfast.”</p>
<p>The gesture left McCoy momentarily speechless.</p>
<p>“Bones, what you did deserves some recognition, no matter who it comes from. And some of those people will be eating crow with their grits. It’ll make yours taste great – not as if you need any help liking grits – and maybe it’ll make theirs taste better too.”</p>
<p>“Atonement as seasoning, huh? Good for the soul, if not to the taste buds? Alright, you win. I’d appreciate some help puttin’ myself together so’s I don’t look like a fool on my first day back.”</p>
<p>As they arranged Leta’s tunic and sling, her nerves got the better of her. She whispered to herself, “I feel so ugly.”</p>
<p>“I heard that.” Jim pulled the waist support around from her back to her front. “Hey,” he tilted her chin up, “your scars show that you were stronger and smarter than them.”</p>
<p>He held her gaze for a moment and she nodded. When he let her go, Leta cleared her throat. “I hope you don’t mind me sayin’, Jim, that I can relate a little now to how you feel.”</p>
<p>“What do you mean?” Jim’s face was now somber.</p>
<p>“You told me that people expect either the best or the worst of you because of your dad.” He nodded. “It’s amazin’ you don’t scream at their hypocrisy when they finally recognize <em>your</em> talents and act like they knew you could do it all along.”</p>
<p>“That’s why I want to prove myself, Bones.”</p>
<p>She grabbed his shoulder in turn. “You don’t need to prove yourself to them or anyone. You only need to prove yourself <em>to yourself. </em>More important to me is that you’re a good man, Jim Kirk. You didn’t give up on me, so I won’t give up on you. I’m not sure where that’ll take us, but I want you to know I’ll do right by you.”</p>
<p>______________</p>
<p>When they stepped outside the door, Leta automatically checked it again. In the short time Jim had been there, someone had written “McCoy – 18, JPT – 0.” Leta left it.</p>
<p>They exited the dorm complex together. Walking across the courtyard to the mess, a number of people inclined their heads towards her. Almost six weeks ago, most of them wouldn’t have looked at her. Minding her manners, Leta refrained from rolling her eyes and graciously acknowledged each of them with a nod of her own. Jim sniggered at the discomfort he knew she was feeling.</p>
<p>“Asshole,” she whispered and nudged him with her good arm.</p>
<p>“But I’m <em>your</em> asshole, Bones, and you wouldn’t have it any other way.” He gave her a lopsided smile as he whispered the reply.</p>
<p>“So help me, it’s true.” Leta shook her head in mock exasperation.</p>
<p>When they reached the foyer of the main mess hall, they could hear the breakfast din wafting towards them. Hundreds of cadets chattering about the weekend past, commenting about the food (“What are grits? Vulcan oatmeal?”), and complaining about classes, overlaid with the clanking of dishes and scraping of chairs. When Kirk and McCoy walked into the seating area, the cacophony muted itself, like the volume had been turned down. A number of heads turned their way. Leta wanted to leave and hesitated.</p>
<p>Anticipating her reaction, Jim put a hand on her back and nudged her forward, “Come on, Bones. Let’s not disappoint Chef. Grits, remember?”</p>
<p>As they walked up to the food service counter, the volume went back up. The staff insisted that the doctor should just tell them what she wanted and they would bring it out to her table. Jim told them she wanted extra bacon, to build her muscles back up. Leta couldn’t help an eye roll at that. She asked for an extra helping of grits, with real butter, in addition to her standard egg whites and fruit.</p>
<p>After being seated and served, Jim-the-asshole couldn’t let a good dig slip by. Holding a piece of bacon in front of her face, he teased, “So, I take it cholesterol doesn’t matter when it comes to grits?” He started chewing on his bacon, loudly.</p>
<p>“Nope.” Bones popped the ‘p’ sound. “And my free gift to you today is ignorin’ the fact that you ordered your bacon, my bacon, and my extra bacon.”</p>
<p>Jim snorted while shoving her bacon into his mouth. Leta thought it was appropriate that he sounded like a pig.</p>
<p>Moments later, a cadet approached the table and Jim almost choked on the extra bacon. It was Uhura, first name TBD.</p>
<p>Without preamble, Uhura said, “Doctor McCoy, it’s my understanding the grits were in your honor. They were…interesting. The blandness reminds me of ugali, but the texture is just the opposite. I’m sure its familiarity is a small comfort after such a stressful event.”  </p>
<p>“It is, Uhura.” There had to be a punch line coming.</p>
<p>“I thought I would share another small comfort with you. The communications department sees announcements before the rest of the campus because we set up the comm bursts as part of our training. So, I’m sure you didn’t hear yet that the Surgeon General will announce his retirement this afternoon, effective tomorrow.”</p>
<p>McCoy mostly succeeded in keeping her expression professionally neutral as she said, “That’s news to me. Thanks, Uhura.”</p>
<p>McCoy’s barely-there professionalism epically failed after Uhura left. Smiling at Jim, who was also smiling a mile wide, she loudly declared, “Best damn grits I ever tasted!”</p>
<p>Chef was happy too.</p>
<p>______________</p>
<p>The only bad part about breakfast was its timing, immediately before <em>History of the Federation</em> class.   McCoy was trying to keep the best damn grits from making an encore appearance as she and Jim walked up to the lecture hall. It was a good thing she didn’t eat the bacon.</p>
<p>When Leta saw Jake Finnegan hanging outside the door they were heading for, she said to Jim, “I might throw up on you.”</p>
<p>“Take it easy, Bones. You faced down terrorists. You can face down Finnegan. Besides, these are my new shoes.”</p>
<p>Small comforts evidently came in threes. Finnegan didn’t say a word. He simply held the door for McCoy and went to his seat after she passed him. As she took her own seat, very slowly, McCoy noticed other cadets filling in the spaces around her and Jim to her left. Her neighbor even helped her take off the sling.</p>
<p>The grits stayed down. Jim’s new shoes were safe.</p>
<p>Instead of Professor Nguyen, Captain Pike appeared at the front of the room and went to the podium. A guest speaker was not on the syllabus. All talk died down in anticipation of something interesting, or at least important.</p>
<p>“What binds the Federation together is trust,” he began in his smooth, but commanding voice. “The Federation relies on Starfleet to support that trust. On a starship or a starbase, the crew will rely on each one of you as future officers to maintain trust with them and with your fellow officers. <em>But</em>, if we can’t trust one another here, how can we trust one another in the black? Trust is too big a topic to finish talking about today, but let’s start.”</p>
<p> </p>
<p>THE END</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Notes for the Chapter:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
          <p>I envision Uncle Darren as an older Karl Urban, like a fine wine.</p>
        </blockquote></div></div>
<a name="section0008"><h2>8. Epilogue</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Jim was studying while Bones was slicing and dicing with her kickass kitchen knife collection. Before the JPT incident, she wielded a blade against veggies like a ninja. A month post-surgery, Leta was enjoying a return to food prep, but she wasn’t allowed to overdo it with repetitive motion. Cooking would help with healing, as long as she took it easy.</p>
<p>Next to eating Bones’ food, Jim liked putting away the knives. Bones stored the blades like a boss. They got thrown at a wooden block she had mounted on the wall.  He paused his PADD on warp theory and got up to do his part.</p>
<p><em>Thwack. “</em>Bones, I have a question.”</p>
<p>“Don’t you always, Jim?”</p>
<p><em>Thwack. </em>“Why were you carrying a hypo full of sedatives in the bar at Riverside? And why didn’t you use the knife in the fight? And why’d you have a knife anyway?”</p>
<p>“That’s three questions, Jim.”</p>
<p>“But they’re related, like a single question with three parts.” <em>Thwack. </em> “Quit stalling, Bones.”</p>
<p>“The second and third questions are easier to answer than the first.”</p>
<p><em>Thwack. </em>“So, get on with it!”</p>
<p>“I’ve carried a knife as a tool for years. Not in a hospital, of course. Got in the habit from Uncle Darren. As for the fight, I didn’t use the knife because the haters said they wanted to fight the old-fashioned way.”</p>
<p><em>Thwack. </em>“Would you have used it if they had pulled a weapon?”</p>
<p>“That's a fourth question, by the way. The answer is: it depends on the exact circumstances. I wouldn’t’ve wanted the knife to fall into their hands or maybe one of us good guys would’ve ended up dead. I knew what I was doing with the sedative. If they were on drugs, the most likely suspect bein’ “shifter,” the stuff I had on me wouldn’t’ve produced a fatal interaction.”</p>
<p><em>Thwack. </em>“So, answer the first question.”</p>
<p>“Paranoia. When I became a doctor, pretty much all of my shifts had crazy hours ‘cause I was low in the peckin’ order. I started carryin’ a hidden hypo as a defense of last resort after a couple of bad experiences late at night.”</p>
<p>Jim thought about Pike’s statement that the JPT had been after Bones before.</p>
<p><em>Thwack. </em>“If someone got hold of that first, they could incapacitate you.”</p>
<p>“I’m aware of that, but I was gonna do somethin’ to protect myself.  I couldn't very well carry a fencing sabre with me.  I didn’t have time for self-defense classes, even if I had been inclined, until my fellowship was done, which is when Pike showed up. You know I hate shuttles, so I drove a hovercar to Riverside and carried the hypo with me on the road trip.”</p>
<p>“Wait. That hypo was in your jacket pocket. That means you trusted me right from the start.”</p>
<p>“I saw you had a sense of honor that the others didn’t.” She handed Jim a plate with a fond look. “Time to eat." </p>
<p>Between bites, Leta continued her train of thought, "Next year, I’ll have the benefit of finishin’ a hand-to-hand class, if they’re really teachin’, that is.”</p>
<p>“You know Pike took care of those people, right?” Jim said, having eaten the potatoes first.</p>
<p>“Yeah. I presumed that was gonna be part of the fallout, along with all the other changes.”</p>
<p>After they finished eating, they put the dishes in the recycler. Leta stood in the middle of the floor gnawing at her bottom lip while Jim prepared to settle back down to studying.</p>
<p>He looked up. “What’s wrong?”</p>
<p>“Jim, now that I’ve answered some questions for you, I was wonderin’ if you could answer a question for me.” She held up a hand. “Before you say “yes,” I’ll warn you it’s a little weird.”</p>
<p>“I highly doubt you could shock me. Bring it on, Bones.”</p>
<p>Leta went behind the room divider that constituted a bedroom and came out with a plasteel box about a half meter square.</p>
<p>“Uhm. I was wonderin’ if you could tell me which one you like the best. I need an expert opinion.”</p>
<p>She opened the box to reveal six globules of gelatinous material.</p>
<p>With a waggle of his eyebrows, Jim said in a provocative voice, “Oh, Bones, it’s not even my birthday. Do you want me to compare them against the real thing?”</p>
<p>Leta McCoy was blushing on the outside and smiling on the inside.</p>
<p> </p>
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